


to the bottom of the river

by savrenim



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Enemies to Friends, Gen, M/M, Skating anime? Demon pacts., Victor is completely oblivious to the degree to which he has been held in esteem, Yurio-centric fic, Yuuri saves the day by being a Decent Human Being, and also understanding what it’s like to deal with mental illness, but Yuri Plisetsky has just ~got~ to be way more extra than that, for short periods of time in return for small favors, set in a world where people casually lease their souls to demons, the slow but inexorable tale about how Yuri Plisetsky got adopted by pretty much everyone
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-01
Updated: 2017-08-06
Packaged: 2018-11-07 20:31:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 66,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11066571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/savrenim/pseuds/savrenim
Summary: "If selling my soul is what it takes to win, I'll give you this body, no holds barred.”Because after all, Yuri had no soul left to sell.





	1. promise

_hold my hand  
ooh baby, it’s a long way down to the bottom of the river._

___________________________________________

Yuri Plisetsky was four years old when he sold his soul to the devil.

It wasn’t particularly hard—his mother tended to leave her summoning materials out, even though she had tried to wean off of the habit after she’d had him, but he’d seen her do it often enough. So when his grandfather collapsed and Yuri could barely feel a pulse and his mother was an hour away, bartending, because the tips gave them _something_ to live off of, Yuri didn’t try to call the police, or an ambulance. He spread a white mat on the floor, lit five red candles, drew the most powerful sigil he knew in black charcoal, and spoke words he did not understand, his pronunciation _perfect._

He didn’t bother to introduce himself, when the devil showed up. “I want my grandfather back alive, and well, as if this had never happened,” he said. 

The devil eyed him thoughtfully. “Healing old people is hard,” it said. “They’re frail. You fix one thing and another thing gives.”

“Tell me how long you want,” Yuri demanded. “I won’t even haggle that much. I want him back.”

“How about this,” the devil said. “I bring him back, and then for as long as I keep your soul, he is alive and well. You can call off the deal any time, and life will take its course.”

Yuri hesitated. 

“You can get years out of an arrangement of this sort,” the devil said. “You’d get a day, maybe two, if you asked me just to heal him. I’m giving you the deal of a lifetime, kid.”

“Fine,” Yuri said. “I accept.”

He cut his left palm with his mother’s silver dagger, and dripped the blood into the center of the sigil. Something shifted within the devil—it seemed to _glow_ , only the kind of glow like when the bruised-purple clouds of a summer thunderstorm were lit with lightening from within. He waited for the boom of thunder, but it never came.

“Pleasure doing business with you,” the devil said. 

Five minutes later, his grandfather woke up, and found Yuri curled up in front of the old television with a blanket wrapped around his shoulders and a blank expression on his face.

“You know it’s past your bedtime,” his grandfather had scolded. Gently, as if a part of him somehow knew that something momentous had happened.

Yuri huffed, but obeyed.

It didn’t feel any different than any other night. That was almost what stuck with Yuri the most. It didn’t feel any _different._

___________________________________________

**Sochi, Grand Prix Final**

There was someone crying in the men’s restroom. It was starting to get on his nerves.

From the snippets of conversation Yuri couldn’t understand, it wasn’t hard to deduce that it was the Japanese skater. The one that had flubbed his free program. Yuuri Katsuki. 

Yuri _hated_ it when people cried, but more than that, he had hated watching Katsuki skate from the stands. There had been a black cloud hanging over the man’s head the whole time, one that Yuri suspected he knew exactly the origin of.

It made him angry just thinking about it, so he kicked the door in, as hard as he could.

(It didn’t fly open like he’d hoped. But the Japanese man unlocked it and stepped out anyway.) 

“Sorry, sorry!” 

Here in person, standing just one foot in front of him, it was even more obvious. More unmistakable. Katsuki had sold his soul. Recently, and for something big.

_And he hadn’t even managed to win._

No, he was just standing there—cowering there—staring at Yuri like Yuri himself was the demon coming to collect. It made Yuri sick. 

“I’m competing in the senior division next year,” he spit. “We don’t need two Yuri’s in the same bracket. Incompetents like you should just retire already, _moron._ ”

Then he stormed out before the other man could respond.

It was probably a bit rude. But he had a reputation for being rude. And besides, ideally, he would never see Katsuki again.

___________________________________________

He saw Katsuki again. Not even an hour later. He and Victor were walking out, Victor had been saying something along the lines of “Yuri, about your free performance, the step sequence could use more—” and he’d snapped “I won, so who cares, quit nagging, Victor—” and Yakov had started yelling “You couldn’t talk that way forever—” and then Victor had noticed the pig _staring_ and asked him if he wanted a commemorative photo. Yuri could feel his anger flaring up again at the idea of someone _that tainted_ standing next to Victor’s light while he had to smile and hold a camera or some shit, but the pig just ran away.

Yuri pretended he couldn’t feel Victor’s disappointment next to him.

___________________________________________

Okay no one was _ever_ allowed to mention the banquet, and Yuri really meant it this time, he _really_ was never going to see Katsuki again.

___________________________________________

When Katsuki uploaded the video of himself skating Victor’s routine, the first thing that Yuri thought was, _you don’t actually look that bad without the black cloud following you around._

The first thing that he _said_ was “idiot,” and then not much else as Yakov yelled at him to get back on the rink.

The fear that Victor might leave because what if—what if this was more than just a publicity stunt— _what if Katsuki had made a deal bad enough to compromise Victor’s free will_ —didn’t set in until Yuri got home.

(It was too late, of course, Victor was gone the very next day.)

It took Yuri one week to book a ticket. Knocked out half a year’s worth of savings, and Yakov was going to be _furious_ with him, but it didn’t matter, because Victor was an idiot and someone needed to protect him and clearly Yakov wasn’t stepping up to the job. And besides, Victor had _promised._

It took Yuri five minutes after the plane landed to realize that this was an absolutely terrible idea and he had no better plan than to try to retrace the steps of all of Victor’s tagged Instagram photos. It took Yuri an hour and forty minutes before he’d bought the absolute coolest sweatshirt he had ever seen and Yakov was calling _him_ to yell at _him_ for running off to Japan too. 

Like hell he’d give up on this.

___________________________________________

Yuri had been twelve years old when he’d met Victor Nikiforov properly. He’d _heard_ of the man—everyone at the rink had heard of Yakov’s star student who had never made a deal in his life, not even the smart ones like “if I fall today I won’t get injured seriously” before practicing new jumps or “this sprained ankle will be gone in a three days” not to be taken out of a competition. The kind that only cost an hour or two, not days or weeks. No, Victor always skated with no safety net, was protected by the sheer magnitude of his own talent, and if Yuri wanted to make it in this world—well, his soul was already leased. He couldn’t go making any more deals. So he needed to be _just as good._

And he was just as good. Who else could land a quadruple Salchow in competition at twelve? The judges had been rather impressed. Yakov, less so.

“I told you repeatedly that quads are off-limits because your body’s still developing!“ the man had yelled. “One of these days you’re going to get hurt and you make a deal to fix it, and I get to deal with a minor under my watch having sold his soul to the devil! If you can’t follow orders, then quit!”

Yuri snorted. Yakov had rather strict rules about the junior skaters at his rink, but that one, he was perfectly fine obeying.

“Yakov, you should praise him more.”

Victor Nikiforov was looking down at them from the stairs.

_Victor Nikiforov had come to his competition._

“Don’t butt in!” Yakov had shouted. “It’s none of your business!”

Victor had smiled at Yuri instead. “I used to get scolded for doing that, too. You can win, even without quads. I’d bet money on it. You can win the Junior World Championship.” _You can win without making deals._ That part was left unspoken.

Yuri had clambered up on top of the benches, and stuck his hand out for Victor to shake. “Fine, if I win without quad jumps, then choreograph a program just for me!”

Victor had _promised._ “Sure,” he had said. “When you win the Junior World Championship, come see me. I’ll give you the best senior debut ever.”

Yuri won _twice._

And the Junior Grand Prix Final _twice._

Victor _owed_ him.

But more than that, it was…hard to deal with things changing. He _knew_ that he was getting angrier, and more often, knew that when he got back from the rink at night he’d just collapse with Potya and eat chips and scroll on his phone until exhaustion overtook him, that he couldn’t remember the last time that he had felt something properly. That people didn’t last without their souls very long. Over a decade was _unheard_ of. Hell, he’d barely heard of any cases of people lasting over a year. That on top of it all, his body was going to be changing soon, that as likely as not he’d lose all the balance and flexibility he flaunted on the rink. Sometimes it felt like he was barely holding it together day to day, and those days were the scariest, because on those days he was the angriest, and he didn’t know what would happen if he were to lose control. Or he was the numbest. And he didn’t know what would happen if he gave up.

Victor was supposed to be _there_ for him. Yuri was Russia’s new up-and-coming prodigy, and Victor was supposed to choreograph his senior debut and maybe give a shit about his legacy because Yuri was his legacy and goddamnit he was not going to let the Japanese _pig_ with the worst demon deal he had ever seen hanging over his head steal Victor from him.

___________________________________________

Screaming Victor’s name as loud as he could made him feel a bit better. And actually proved to be useful; some fisherman told him where the single skating rink in town was. A crowd of reporters, held off by three toddlers, confirmed it.

And then the pig had run up to the doors.

This time, Yuri’s kick was successful. The pig sprawled down across the floor, and Yuri was able to indulge his deep desire to step on the man’s face.

“It’s all your fault! Apologize!”

“Sorry, sorry,” Katsuki was already saying. 

Only something was wrong. No new deal was hanging over his head. Which meant that…Victor had come on his own? 

He let Katsuki up. "What the hell is going on?"

"Victor showed up and said he'd be my coach?" Katsuki said.

Something was wrong. Something was very wrong. Yuri had seen the pig grinding on Victor, seen him beg Victor to come and be his coach, and now he thought he could just stare at Yuri, wide-eyed and innocent, like he didn't know what was going on?

"Why are you here?" Katsuki prompted, because apparently Yuri had been staring for too long.

"Dragging Victor back to Russia, what else would I be doing?" Yuri snapped.

"B..b..back to Russia?" the pig said.

Yuri rolled his eyes. “He promised me first that he’d choreograph a program for me. What about you?”

“Huh? We haven’t gotten to talking about programs or anything.”

Yuri did a double-take. “What?! You make him take a whole year off, and to do what? Isn’t getting him as a coach enough?" Katsuki backed up, his hands up in the universal surrender gesture, as if that would save him. "As if a guy who’d sob in a toilet stall at the Grand Prix Final can change at all just by getting Victor as a coach!”

And then suddenly Katsuki was _smiling_ at him.

It was unnerving.

Maybe this guy had a demon deal in place, nobody could look that unfazed.

“Stop smirking, fatso!”

Katsuki most certainly did _not_ stop smirking. Oh, he hid it well, looking all unassuming and non-confrontational but _Katsuki was most certainly smirking at him._ “I don’t really get the whole picture, so you should ask him yourself.”

As if Yuri didn’t plan to.

Victor was just in the rink, skating...the very arrangements for programs he'd been making for the next season. It hit Yuri—really hit him—how much Victor was giving up, coming here. His career, his—the ice was everything to them, they were alike in that regard at least. But it wasn't just the ice, for Victor. It was the spotlight that followed him on it too. It was _sharing_ the ice.

Victor would never be happy as a coach.

The pig was looking at him, and Yuri wondered how much of that he'd said out loud.

"Victor was already putting together routines for next season," Yuri said. "But he was really torn. Surprising the audience has always been his top priority. He had the whole world in his hands. But now, no matter what he does, no one's surprised. He knows that better than anyone."

Yuri stared at Victor as he transitioned into a spin. "If you don't have any inspiration left, you're as good as dead. It's like skating without a soul."

Katsuki flinched. 

Good.

"If he’s going to take next season off, I wonder if he’ll let me use his program," Yuri said. At this point he was basically thinking out loud. "I know I can surprise people more. I need Victor’s help if I’m going to make my senior debut and win the Grand Prix Final."

"Huh? Win?" the pig said.

The conversation clearly wasn't worth continuing. "Hey, you look like you're doing great, Victor!" Yuri shouted.

Victor turned, drawing to a graceful halt. "Yuri, you’re here? I’m surprised Yakov let you come. What do you want?"

Yuri liked to think of himself as at least somewhat dignified, even if he was never composed, with his outbursts. This time, he _screamed_. 

Victor just smiled.

"Judging from that look, I’m guessing I forgot some promise I made."

This was on purpose, this had to be on purpose, and Yuri wasn't going to let him get away with it.

"You _swore_ that you'd choreograph my senior debut if I could win Worlds without quads! I did! Twice! Geezer!"

Victor skated to the edge of the rink. "I did?"

"Yes," Yuri hissed.

Victor stared at him a moment, then shrugged. "Hahaha, sorry, sorry, I totally forgot. But you knew I was the forgetful type, right?" He was still smiling that _stupid_ smile that he always used to get away with things.

"Yeah, I’m painfully aware of that," Yuri said. "But a promise is a promise! You’ll choreograph my new program, Victor!" Yuri could feel Victor's attention slipping, Victor's eyes on the pig instead of him, and it made him furious. "Let’s go back to Russia!"

Victor had to go back, it didn't matter if Katsuki currently had a deal or not, he was _dangerous_. This was _dangerous._ From the expression on Victor's face, Yuri was fairly certain that no matter what he said or did, Victor wasn't here on a whim. There was something deeper, something that he couldn't grasp. A promise to Yuri wasn't going to hold him, fair or no. It hurt. Not that Yuri would ever admit it.

"Okay, I’ve decided!" Victor said. "Tomorrow, I’ll choreograph a program for both of you to the same music I’m using in my short program!"

That was _not_ what Yuri expected. And apparently, not what Katsuki had expected either. “With the same music as him?” Yuri squawked at the same time that Katsuki was saying “with the same choreography?”

“No, this piece has several different arrangements,” Victor said, completely oblivious to the tumult he was causing. “I was trying to decide which one to use. I’ll think of a different program for each of you, of course. We’ll reveal the programs in one week. You’ll compete to see who can surprise the audience more!” 

This was simultaneously…the most _Victor_ thing to do, but Yuri could also _see_ how superficial it was. Victor wasn’t going to change his mind about this easily. Which meant that it was probably a waste of time being here, but…

“Let’s take a step back here. I don’t want to be punished for losing,” the pig was saying.

“Victor will do whatever the winner says! If those are the terms, I’m in!” Yuri cut in, just to make him squirm.

“Great! I love that kind of thing!” Victor said.

Victor’s smile was fake, Yuri decided for certain, but his excitement wasn’t. Yuri wondered if Katsuki could see it too, from the expression on the man’s face. _Good, no one here is getting what they want,_ he thought bitterly.

The toddlers who had recognized him and let him past the reporters appeared as if summoned like demons to begin the advertising process, and Victor was still smiling, so whatever. Yuri would beat the pig with the whole world watching and then life could go back to normal. 

“Hot Springs on Ice.” A stupid name for his stupid senior debut, but Yuri had known it was stupid coming here, and he wasn’t going to back down now.

___________________________________________

The onsen was a hovel.

The pig was apparently rather surprised by the fact that Yuri was planning on staying there, like hell he’d let Victor stay unsupervised. And when he let the pig know— _It’s not like you care what I think,_ the pig had said. 

It unsettled him. 

Like the pig was _seeing right through_ him.

Katsuki might not have a demon deal right now, but there was something _wrong_ with him.

Yuri managed to get a private bath, in a tub, because he was _not_ going to bathe in public. And then, hair still damp, he was plopped down on the floor and a bowl of food was plopped in front of him and he _inhaled_ it because he hadn’t eaten at all yet today. He paused when he was about halfway finished to wipe off his mouth and face the rest of the table. “This is great,” he shouted, tone just as angry as all of his prior demands, but he really did feel a bit better with some food in his stomach.

Victor smiled at him indulgently. “The pork cutlet bowl is good, isn’t it?”

Yuri glared daggers but decided to eat more instead of answering because it _was_ good, goddamnit.

His meal was threatened to be interrupted again by the appearance of someone behind him who shot off something in Japanese, which meant it should be safe to ignore, except she said his name so he turned around. The woman was tall, and looked almost _scary_ with the juxtaposition of her bleached hair and nonchalant expression and tone. Like she’d take you out and find it boring. And she was _staring_ at him.

“His name is also Yuri,” Hiroko—Katsuki’s mother, maybe the only person Yuri found tolerable here because the woman was so unbelievably, smotheringly _kind_ —said. 

Immediately, the scary-woman’s entire composure changed. “What? That’s confusing. You’re Yurio.” And Yuri didn’t have time to react or anything before “Where will Yurio stay?”

“Upstairs in—“ Katsuki started to say, but apparently annoying woman knew exactly where Yuri was going to stay, because she cut him off with something in Japanese, and then Katsuki was being dragged off presumably to help clean, and Yuri and Victor were left alone at the table.

Good, Yuri wanted the chance to give Victor a piece of his mind.

“I can’t believe you came for _this_ ,” he spit.

“But the food is good!” 

“You didn’t come here for the food and we both know it!” Yuri said. “I can’t believe how selfish you are! Now _I’m_ Yakov’s best chance of getting gold in men’s singles. I’m Russia’s best chance!”

“Good for you, Yurio,” Victor said, and Yuri could feel the anger rising again, choking him.

“Shut up! That’s not my name!”

Victor just laughed. “So how is everyone?” he asked. “Mila hasn’t been answering _any_ of my texts, I’m _dying_ to know the new gossip. How are Georgi and Anya doing?”

Yuri stared at him, mouth open. “Victor. Georgi and Anya broke up four months ago.”

“Whaaat?” Victor drew out the vowel, his voice rising half an octave. “But they were so in love!”

“His whole _theme_ for the season is heartbreak, and you didn’t fucking notice?”

Victor shrugged. “I guess I’ve been busy.”

“Busy,” Yuri repeated. 

“Finding inspiration is an all-consuming task!” Victor said with his signature grin. “One day you’ll understand, Yurio.”

Yeah, right. But Yuri wasn’t going to say anything. He laid his head on the table, partially out of exasperation, but then he found that he didn’t really want to pick it up. The jet-lag must have been getting to him. Victor sprawled out on the floor like a big cat, watching him fondly, until annoying woman (who Yuri had deduced was Katsuki’s sister, but until she called him by his name he refused to think of her as anything else), came back into the room to start clearing their plates.

“Where’s Yuuri?” Victor asked.

“He left a while ago,” annoying woman said. “At a time like this he’d be at Minako’s place or the Ice Castle. He’s always been that way.”

Victor glanced at Yuri, and Yuri didn’t move. “Oh,” he said, and he stood up.

It wasn’t until about five minutes after Victor had left the room that Yuri realized that he had probably gone and followed Katsuki, instead of going to bed. Yuri had no idea who, where, or what Minako’s was, and he didn’t want to walk all the way back to the rink, which gave him two options: wait up for them, or go to sleep himself.

Wait up, he decided. He wanted to actually talk to Katsuki. Make it clear that Victor was far too good for him. 

Unfortunately, staying awake until Katsuki got home meant that he was there when Victor returned first.

“You should get to your room,” Victor said gently. “We have a big day tomorrow.”

“We have a big day every day,” Yuri said. “I needed to—“ But he couldn’t tell Victor he needed to talk to the pig, or Victor would stay awake as well, and that would defeat the entire purpose of trying to talk to Katsuki privately.

“Why did you follow me?” Victor asked.

“I needed to make sure you were safe,” Yuri said. Stupid, stupid, stupid, this was why he didn’t talk to people when he was tired. Because things dangerously close to the truth came out.

“What do you mean?”

The cat was already out of the bag, so he might as well tell Victor the rest of this whole fucked-up story that only Yuri could see.

“Katsuki had one of the biggest demon deals I’ve ever seen hanging over his head at the Grand Prix Final,” Yuri said. “So I was worried that he made another deal to make you come out here. Only he didn’t.” Yuri paused. “Which doesn’t make this any less stupid. Only your fault.”

“Aaaw, you care,” Victor cooed. 

“Shut up,” Yuri snapped. “It’s only because you owe me, old man.”

“I didn’t know you could see demon deals,” Victor said. “I didn’t know that _anyone_ could, I mean. There are machines, but…”

“Well I can,” Yuri said. “I’ve been able to since I was a small kid. Why do you think I can always tell if any of you go out drinking? Besides how awful you are at sneaking out? Not you, of course, but you think I fell for Mila and Georgi being chipper all those mornings? Fuck no, I’m not blind.”

“Is that why you never make deals?” Victor asked. “Oh, is that why you get so snappy some mornings? Does it bother you when—“

“Shut up,” Yuri said. “I shouldn’t have told you, if you’re going to be even _more_ annoying. I just thought you should know that your precious Katsuki wasn’t as golden as you think he is. He’s _disgusting_ to look at.”

Victor was quiet for a moment, enough for Yuri to think that maybe this was it, maybe this was the moment that Victor would give up on the pig and come back to Russia with him, maybe it was _actually_ this easy, ~~maybe he shouldn’t have shared such private information without Katsuki’s knowledge or permission~~ , when Victor turned back to him and smiled that _blinding_ smile and said, “Does this mean that I _glow_? Yurio, you have to tell me, am I prettier than everyone else? Do I—“

“That’s not my name!” Yuri shouted. “Shut up! I’m going to bed!”

He stormed out before he realized that he hadn’t had the chance to catch Katsuki, but whatever, that could wait for tomorrow. He was _not_ going to go back down there and talk to _Victor_ again.

___________________________________________

Yuri wished he could say that he laid awake thinking about everything that had happened that day, gone over all of the details, maybe he could have noticed _something_ that would tip him off to what was to come.

Instead, he was asleep the moment his head hit the pillow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> song comes from the Delta Rae song “Bottom of the River” <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bimam2j2gEg>
> 
> this thing actually does have an outline and full plan; I just haven't decided how many chapter breaks there will be, hence the uncertainty there
> 
> I guess I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


	2. agape

They started training first thing the next morning. Victor biked; Yuri, the dog, and the pig got to run behind him. Makka actually seemed happy about the arrangement, the stupid mutt was happy about everything, Yuri was competent, and the pig lagged behind. Yuri got called Yurio nine times as Victor tried to get him to say hello to locals. It was humiliating and he hated it.

 _Finally_ , they got to the rink. Immediately, Victor was all business. On the ice, stereo ready to go, remote in his hand. “First, let’s have you two listen to the music,” he said. “This piece comes in two arrangements, each with a different theme.'On Love: Eros and Agape.' Have you ever thought about love?”

“Nope,” Yuri said, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible. Next to him, the pig was shaking his head.

Victor doesn’t look at all fazed, but then again, Victor had been dealing with Yuri’s antics on the rink for years now.

“Alright. Then what do you feel when you listen to this music?”

Katsuki perked up like a teacher’s pet. “It’s very clear and innocent, like someone who doesn’t know what love is yet.” 

_’Like someone who doesn’t know what love is yet.’_ Yuri wondered if it was a taunt, payback for the previous day’s _‘it’s like skating without a soul.’_ It _couldn’t_ be, Katsuki had no way of knowing. 

“I don’t like this piece. This innocence crap makes me want to barf,” he said. Katsuki side-eyed him. _What, it’s true,_ he thought.

“Okay,” Victor said, and clicked the remote. The music changed.

Now this—this was something that Yuri could skate to. Music bright enough to carry an emotion that Yuri himself couldn't produce. 

"It's like a completely different song!" the pig said.

"Victor, I want to skate to this one," Yuri said.

Victor smiled at them. "The first piece is 'On Love: Agape.' The theme is unconditional love. And this piece is 'On Love: Eros.' The theme is sexual love."

 _Come on, come on, get it over with,_ Yuri thought.

"I’ll have you two skate to these opposing themes."

Obviously. If Victor would ever get over indulging his own taste for dramatics and fucking tell them who was skating to what.

"This is how I’m assigning them. Yuri, you’ll skate to 'Eros'! Yurio, you’ll skate to 'Agape'!"

Well then.

It occurred to Yuri that he was in far over his head, not because of any demon deal, but because Victor Nikiforov had traveled 5000 miles for a booty call and nothing Yuri could do was ever going to be able to get in the way.

Then the panic began to sink in that Yuri was going to have to skate to Agape. _Yuri was going to be forced to perform a routine based on an emotion he hadn’t felt in over a decade._

“Switch them! That piece isn’t me at all!” he shouted, and he cursed himself for it, because he was probably harming his case more than helping it. The pig whined in his own surprise and dismay in the background.

"You have to do the opposite of what people expect. How else will you surprise them? That’s my motto," Victor said. "Actually, you’re both far more ordinary and mediocre than you think. You need to be more self-aware. I’m surprised you think you can choose your own image. From the audience’s perspective, you’re just a piglet and a kitten. If you aren’t up to my standards by next week, I won’t choreograph either of your programs. Both of you are my fans, so I’m sure you’ll manage."

Sometimes, Yuri wanted to punch Victor in the face. His _fans_? Maybe the pig was Victor's fan, but Yuri—Yuri had come all this way to—

"Fine. I’ll skate to Agape," Yuri said. "My senior division debut depends on it! You’d better give me a program that’ll let me win!"

(Because winning. That was safe. That was an emotion he and Victor could agree on.)

Victor smiled down at him. "It’s up to you whether you win or not. If I skated the program, I’d win for sure."

In all of his years of knowing Victor, Victor had never been this much of an asshole. 

(But then again, the Victor that he knew wouldn't have run off to Japan on a whim the year of his senior debut.)

"If I win, Victor, you’re coming back to Russia. And you’ll be my coach! That’s what I want!" 

( _His_ Victor back. That's what he wanted.)

"Sure," Victor said, dismissive.

Next to him, the pig stiffened, as if the mere mention of Victor leaving was enough to send him into a panic. Katsuki was so—there were times when he looked so _unflappable_ that Yuri thought that he was playing them all, and then times that he looked like a baby deer that could barely keep its legs underneath it, let alone be the evil mastermind behind the demise of Victor’s skating career and flop of Yuri’s senior debut.

“Yuuri, what about you?” Victor asked. “What would you like to do if you win?”

And this time, it wasn’t darkness that gathered around Katsuki, but instead little streaks of light, like sparklers on a dark beach, soaring and circling around him as he lit up from within and uttered—

“I want to eat pork cutlet bowls with you, Victor. I want to keep on winning and keep on eating pork cutlet bowls!”

What. The. Fuck. Was. Going. On.

“So I’ll skate to ‘Eros’!” the pig continued. “I’ll give it all the eros I’ve got!”

For the first time all day, the smile on Victor’s face was a real smile. “Great, that’s exactly what I like!” he said. He was glowing a bit too.

To repeat: 

What. The. Fuck. Was. Going. On.

(To be fair, Yuri _had_ seen Victor radiate from within or some shit like that before. He’d assumed that it was a byproduct of whatever the mechanism that allowed him to see demon deals was; he didn’t just see deals, he saw souls too sometimes. And everyone knew that Victor had never sold his soul, not even _once_ , but more than that, Victor loved hard and fast and freely and Yuri could always tell because when he really loved something, he’d light up, literally to Yuri and Yuri alone. And, if he thought about it really really hard, maybe a few times when Mila’s been skating he’s seen glints of light around the edges of her figure that could be reflections, or could be whatever the fucked up happy-soul-glow thing he could see was.

Yuri had never seen anyone _shine_ as brightly as Victor did, although Katsuki wasn’t quite—it was a contained shining. He still wore his darkness like a cloak. But he had been _shining_ , goddamnit.

What the fuck was so special about those pork cutlet bowls?)

Victor shooed them off the rink.

“First, Yurio’s ‘On Love: Agape.’” 

The song started playing, perfectly timed from when Victor had set it, because Victor was the master of melodramatic timing, and then he was skating.

It was _relaxing_ watching Victor skate. The movements…they flowed, like water trickling around worn rocks, the music and Victor’s motion merging into one. The ice was bright, and for a moment, Yuri pretended he could feel.

Then the music came to its end, as Victor entered his final pose.

“Kind of like that, what do you think?”

 _It’s beautiful and it’s mine now and I love it,_ Yuri wanted to say, like it was a new piece of cat-related paraphernalia that he could throw money at then keep and bring home and cherish as best he could because that was the best he could do. 

“Yeah, I pretty much got it,” he said instead.

The pig looked rather shocked at this declaration.

Amateur. 

There was clapping from across the rink, and Yuri felt a sudden annoyance, that someone interrupted his _moment_.

“Wow…that was amazing!”

“Who’s that chick?” Yuri growled. 

“Oh, she’s one of the staff here, Yuuko,” the pig said.

“Sorry for interrupting your practice. It was so wonderful, I couldn’t help myself,” Yuuko said.

Yuri tried to glare at her, but she looked so _nice_ and _earnest_ and he ended up just looked down instead, blushing slightly.

“Okay, Yuuri, you’re next,” Victor said, and Yuri was relieved for the distraction. “Let’s go!”

“O-okay!” the pig stammered, and the music started, and Victor began skating.

Ten seconds and one wink in, Yuuko had collapsed to the floor.

Yuri glanced around, but Katsuki was staring at Victor and Victor was skating and there was no one else in the rink so was everyone really going to let this woman bleed out on the floor? Unless this was something that happened all the time, in which case why hadn’t anyone warned him?

“Are you sick?” Yuri whispered.

She just shook her head, and turned towards the rink to keep watching.

Rabid Victor fans. He was skating at a rink run by rabid Victor fans. No wonder Victor loved it here.

Meanwhile, the pig was freaking out; Yuri could practically see the cloud he always carried pulsating around him. Because he thought Victor was hot? Because he didn't know if he could do it himself? Yuri couldn't tell, and he wanted to know.

"Yuuri, how was that?" Victor called.

"Oh, um, it was very Eros!" the pig said.

....the pig didn't have it down. Victor was going to have to show him the choreography a couple of times before he had it memorized. Unlike on Yakov's rink, where there were _higher standards_ in place. Victor, of course, didn't notice, because he was preening under the praise instead. "Right? So, about the program composition…which quads can you land?"

 _None of them, if someone's watching_ , Yuri thought, because he was not in a particularly generous mood.

"The toe loop, and…I can land the Salchow in practice, but never in competition," the pig said. "Um, I think I can do it if I try! So, um…"

"Okay, you can practice the basics. I’ll teach Yurio first," Victor said.

"Huh?" the pig said.

“I won’t teach you anything you can’t do right now,” Victor said, insensitive as always. “How many times have you messed up during a competition?” 

( _Oh, so now Victor figures it out?_ , Yuri thought.)

“You have the skill to win,” Victor continued. “Why can’t you make it happen?”

Katsuki looked down, and then he looked back up, determination glittering in his eyes. “It’s probably because I…lack confidence. I’m…” The look of concentration on his face as he searched for the English word made Yuri want to puke. “I’m mentally weak.”

Victor opened his mouth to say something, but Katsuki plowed forward. “I haven’t been…in America there were laws regarding my visa, that my employer had to know, so Celestino signed off for me, but you’ve only been here a week and you haven’t brought any coaching contract or paperwork so I didn’t know how you would feel about it. I…a little more than six months ago, I was released from a deal that was five years in duration. I was naturally mentally weak before that, but I think it made it worse. The pressure of people watching me becomes too much to deal with.”

“Yuuri,” Victor said, almost reverently, and Yuri _really_ wanted to puke.

“I have paperwork signed by a psychiatrist from America that says I am not a danger to myself or others!” Katsuki said, his posture snapping up. “No one has ever needed to know before, besides my family, my roommate, and my coach. But you’re my coach now, so it’s good that you know!”

“What was it for, pig?” Yuri called over because he was curious, goddamnit, and if Katsuki was perfectly willing to spill his own guts then Yuri was going to take advantage of it.

“Yurio,” Victor scolded. “It’s alright, Yuuri, you don’t have to tell us. You're not mentally weak, you're incredible. You're the strongest person I know!"

 _Um, I’m standing right here,_ Yuri wanted to say, but that would involve admitting that he’d been under a deal for over a decade and could still skate and medal perfectly fine, and that wasn't something he was willing to do.

(Was he a little bit bitter that Katsuki could stand there and talk openly and be praised instead of shouted at? Yeah, he was. But he still had something to lose, and Katsuki didn’t anymore, so he’d just have to fight harder, be better. Without a helping hand.)

Except Katsuki was looking at _him_ , not Victor, which Yuri found a little bit weird, maybe he was waiting for Yuri to react? As if Yuri should care? 

Victor seemed to notice this lack of attention more, Yuri could _feel_ him pouting as he took Katsuki’s chin in his hand. “Right. My job is to make you feel confident in yourself.” He had a thumb on Katsuki’s lip, and he took a step in closer to the pig. “No one in the whole wide world knows your true Eros, Yuuri. It may be an alluring side of you that you yourself are unaware of. Can you show me what it is soon?”

Ew. There were kids in the room. There was one specific kid in the room who _really_ didn’t want to see this. 

Also, Katsuki was freaking out. Trembling. Looked like he wanted to sprint from the ice, or combust right there, and Yuri realized something that _Victor didn't know._

Katsuki couldn't remember the banquet. 

There was no way that a Katsuki who remembered the banquet would ever be _this_ self-conscious. 

Yuri actually...felt a bit bad for him. Victor could be—and clearly was being—a bit overwhelming, and not only had Katsuki not asked for it in a demon deal, Katsuki didn't even know why it was happening.

"Oi, Victor!" Yuri shouted. "Aren't you teaching me first?"

Victor turned to him, and left Katsuki hyperventilating in place. "Right, so Yuuri, think long and hard about what Eros is to you."

___________________________________________

Yuri practiced with Victor all day.

Victor had helped him with his routine for Worlds last season when Yakov kept trying to explain something about his step sequence and Yuri kept not getting it and finally Victor had stepped in and just skated with him for the afternoon, and it felt a little bit like that. It didn't take Yuri very long to get the choreography itself down, but the _movement_ , the _emotions_ —he and Victor went through it again and again, in perfect synchronization, mirror images of one another. Yuri couldn’t feel, but he could _copy_. The ice was cold, and hard; it didn’t ask for truth, only perfection. And perfection could be manufactured, if someone just gave him the steps.

So again, and again, and again, Victor ran him through it.

Except this time, again and again and again, Victor found him lacking. Ten, twenty, maybe even _thirty_ times with Victor just watching and judging, Yuri had lost count.

"Stop, stop!" Victor said. Yuri doubled over, panting. Yeah, stop, he could do that. "Hmm, something isn't right here."

Yuri had been doing it _flawlessly,_ goddamnit, but apparently flawless wasn't good enough for Victor.

"I'm doing it like you showed me, aren’t I?" Yuri said.

"The way you currently are, your greed is too obvious," Victor said. "There’s no sense of agape, unconditional love, in your performance."

 _Of course there's no fucking Agape in my performance,_ Yuri thought. _I can't feel it._ And he had been doing the next best thing, he had been copying Victor to the t, but apparently it wasn't good enough.

"It’s good to have confidence, but this program isn’t where you should show it off," Victor was saying.

"You’re the one who’s skated with complete confidence this whole time!" Yuri shouted. Fucking hypocrite. "Well, what’s Agape to you then, Victor?"

Victor tipped his head back, as if to laugh. ”It’s a feeling, of course, so I could never explain it in words. Do you bother thinking about that when you skate? You’re funny, Yurio.” 

Victor was going to single-handedly destroy _Katsuki’s_ career if this was what he thought coaching was. At least Yakov could tell him _what he was actually doing wrong._

“Well, maybe we need a temple,” Victor continued.

“A temple?” Yuri said.

A temple. A real temple. Where he was supposed to mediate or something? With a real monk striking his shoulders with a real wooden stick every time his posture dropped. Hell.

When Yuri got back to the onsen, he wanted three things: a bath, maybe some of Hiroko's unfairly good food, and then to collapse on his mat and scroll through his Instagram until sleep took him. What happened instead was he ran into Katsuki clearing out the area around the hot springs. Katsuki froze when he first saw him, then relaxed and kept moving the towels or bathrobes or whatever it was that he had in his hands.

“I want a bath,” he grumbled, because Katsuki technically did work here and Yuri didn’t want to deal with his annoying-but-still-a-little-bit-intimidating sister.

“Actually…” Katsuki bit his lip. “We’ve cleared out the guests from the hot springs. Or. I mean. We didn’t have that many guests today. But sometimes when Mari thinks I’m stressed we’ll clear out the hot springs for cleaning for the afternoon and there’s usually a little time afterwards when I can soak alone.”

“Got it. I’ll get out of your way,” Yuri said.

“No, I meant…” Katsuki looked down. “I meant that if you wanted to try the hot springs, it would only be me here.”

Yuri nearly took a step back in pure bafflement. It was just so stupidly… _nice_. Was Katsuki trying to win him over? Trying to knock him off balance, so he could steal the win?

Was Katsuki naturally this way? He hadn’t seemed this nice in any of Yuri’s prior interactions with him, but to be fair, Yuri hadn’t interacted with him much. Only yelled at him a lot. Was he trying to be a good host? Was he trying to win Victor over by clearly having a less shitty attitude than Yuri did? He didn’t have to _try_ for that, no one had a shittier personality than Yuri.

“…Okay,” Yuri said, because he really did want a bath and it looked like Katsuki wasn’t going to sit around and draw him one. He shed his clothes as quickly as possible, went to the small bathing station and scrubbed the sweat from practice off of his body, and then hurried over to the hot springs, not that anyone was watching him. A small sigh escaped as he sank into the water. Katsuki finished cleaning in silence, and then joined him.

Yuri was a little bit worried that Katsuki was going to try to engage him in conversation, but apparently the man was just as wrapped up in his own thoughts. It…wasn’t terrible, sitting there next to the pig.

It was surreal.

Yuri didn’t want to think about it.

Victor came, eventually, to interrupt them, naked to boot. Yuri was too tired to care. Katsuki, too, was apparently too tired to care, which Yuri appreciated. It had been too long a day to deal with any more squealing. 

Victor asked something about taking a photo in the bath for Instagram, and Katsuki shut him down.

Without blushing or stuttering or anything.

Yuri decided that he officially liked this tired version of Katsuki, at least he had a backbone.

Eventually, they moved inside for food. Victor scarfed down a bowl katsudon, Yuri…was falling asleep on the table, honestly, and Katsuki had some healthy shit with broccoli or something. There was the slightly amusing moment when Katsuki jumped up and started shouting about how pork cutlet bowls were eros to him, but considering how out of it Yuri was, he might have hallucinated it.

Either way, Katsuki wasn’t at the table, and then Victor was leaving the table, and placed a hand on Yuri’s shoulder as he walked past. 

“You should get to bed,” Victor said.

“Fuck off,” Yuri said.

Victor laughed and left the room.

Yuri began the long process of attempting to gain enough motivation to stand and walk to his room, and it wasn’t working particularly well, so he sat there, staring at the wall. He was still at the table when Katsuki got back. Katsuki gave him a measured look, then sat down across from him. 

"I'm very sorry if I made you uncomfortable today," he said.

"Uncomfortable?" Yuri said.

"I know that some people are...uncomfortable... with deals?" Katsuki said. He held eye contact, and Yuri shivered.

"I'm from Russia, there are no regulations there," Yuri said. "So I'm surrounded by idiots who make deals all the time. Why the fuck would I be uncomfortable?"

Katsuki wrinkled his forehead. "There was...the interview, from Worlds last year?"

"I'm _personally_ going to beat Victor," Yuri said. "I don't give a shit what anyone else does with _their_ souls."

"Oh," Katsuki said. Yuri glared at him to try to indicate that this conversation was _over_. He felt a lot more awake now, awake enough to leave.

“Hasetsu used to have a lot of onsens,” Katsuki said instead, looking down. “But tourism began to dry up, and it hit the onsens the hardest. I was scared that my family’s business would close. I made a deal, that the onsen could stay open. But I didn’t want it to be at the expense of any of the other inns in town. So instead of something like one year just to save our business, it was five years. I had never made a deal before, so I didn’t know how serious five years was until I went to America to skate with Celestino.”

It was so stupidly naive and stupidly _believable_ that despite the fact that Yuri was inclined to view everything the pig said with suspicion, something about this rang _true_ ; maybe it was the way the pig was sitting, maybe it was the way that the darkness wrapped itself around Katsuki like a child would hold his favorite blanket, but Yuri believed wholeheartedly that Katsuki had actually been an idiot enough to trade his soul away for _five years_ to save his family’s business in the most fair manner he could, and then the other onsens in town had closed anyways.

"Why the fuck are you telling me this?" Yuri said. "Victor is the one who cares about you, what makes you think I give a shit?"

"You...asked?" Katsuki said.

Oh. Right. He had asked. He'd _specifically_ asked and Victor had _specifically_ said it didn't matter.

"Whatever," he said. "Are we done here?"

The pig tilted his head to the side, as if confused, and Yuri couldn't tell _why._ Did he think Yuri was going to yell at him? Judge him? Had Yuri not made it clear that he really didn't care who had what deals, especially since Victor wasn't under the influence of one? 

“I’m glad your stupid onsen didn’t close,” Yuri said, and then he swept out of the room, the pig’s eyes on him the whole way.

___________________________________________

(When all was said and done, Yuri was having a hard time hating Katsuki.

Katsuki hadn’t asked for this. Well, he had asked for this, literally, but he didn’t _remember_ asking for it, which meant that he was as much a victim of Victor’s whims as Yuri was. Katsuki was an idiot, but Victor was an even bigger idiot, and Yuri was not going to blame Katsuki for Victor’s idiocy. Yuri didn’t hate people _indiscriminately_ , he hated them if they were annoying or got in his way or if they messed with him or treated him like a kid or were cringeworthily terrible at their free skate, had a terrible demon deal hanging over their heads, got wasted, embarrassed him publicly, danced dirty with Victor and then begged him to be their coach, and dragged Yuri all the way to Japan to try to fix Victor’s mistake. 

Except Katsuki had made the deal to save his family.

And Yuri…couldn’t hate him for that. He understood what it was like to trade away everything for family. Maybe Katsuki was an idiot, and disgustingly noble and selfless to boot, but Yuri couldn’t hate him for trying to protect his family.

He knew it was stupid to feel differently about Katsuki because Katsuki had made the deal to save his family. He _knew_ that a lot of people made deals for other people. That what Katsuki did wasn’t even as magnanimous as it sounded, because Katsuki had no idea what he was promising when he promised five years. That in fact, Yuri should hate him _more_ , for being an idiot, having made a really stupid deal, and having Victor’s unadulterated admiration for it. 

But try as he might, Yuri couldn’t hate Katsuki as he had before.

He fell asleep.)

___________________________________________

They trained for the next four days, with little break in the monotony. Victor shouted advice at Katsuki to entangle more egg to better express the emotion of his program, and gave Yuri no applicable feedback at all other than trying to send him to the temple every day. Yuri avoided Katsuki as much as possible the moment that they weren’t at the rink, and religiously ensured that he was never _alone_ with Katsuki, so that if Katsuki wanted to say weird shit at least Victor would hear it too, although it wasn’t particularly hard. Bathe, eat, sleep, that was all anyone had the energy for once training was over.

Yuri was starting to get the feeling that Victor was disappointed in him, because there were less and less comments on his performance and more and more run-throughs where Victor would just skate it with him. Those were better, but apparently _agape_ was something you couldn’t learn from copying someone else.

“Maybe a waterfall would help,” Victor said finally.

A waterfall.

Victor sent him to meditate _under a waterfall._

And for some reason, he sent Katsuki along with him.

Yuri was going to _kill_ him.

Why the fuck was standing in cold water supposed to help him feel 'agape'?

“I’m going to kill him.”

“Why me too?” Katsuki complained next to him.

(At least Katsuki hadn’t tried anything weird, like talking to him or being nice to him.)

“Who cares,” Yuri said. “Damn it, who cares about agape?”

Katsuki didn’t have an answer.

It was cold. God, why did Victor have to pull a stunt like this, Yakov would never do something so _stupid_ to endanger his skaters’ health. Yuri missed Yakov. Yuri _actively missed Yakov._ How the fuck could Victor mess up coaching so bad that Yuri _missed Yakov._

(Before Yakov—before he had moved his home rink to St. Petersburg—his grandfather had taken him to practice every day. “Yuratchka, you were the best of the bunch,” he’d always say. Yuri would always ask him to come again the next day, would promise that he could skate even better. And Dedushka would always smile and nod.) 

“Yurio? Hey, Yurio?” Katsuki grabbed his wrist and tugged him forward, out of the waterfall. “Are you okay? Let’s call it a day.”

Yuri didn’t have the energy to get angry about the fact that Katsuki was being nice again.

Because he was getting sick.

Because Victor was a terrible coach.

Obviously.

“Oh…okay,” he said, and sneezed. 

( _Yakov will come kill Victor if I get properly ill, more than just a head cold,_ he thought viciously.)

Still, Yuri wanted to yell at Victor for doing that to him. How could he put Yuri at risk so nonchalantly? And the pig, too? It wasn’t fair to either of them. Victor had never stood in a cold waterfall for nearly an hour two days before a competition. 

Except Victor was out.

Yuri was faced with three choices: find Victor, keep interacting with the pig, or go to bed, and he didn’t—didn’t want to risk the pig trying to talk to him if the pig took him to Victor.

Maybe sleep would help him get his head back on straight.

___________________________________________

Yuri and Katsuki headed to the rink alone the next morning. Yuri could tell that Katsuki was holding onto hope that maybe Victor was meeting them there, but Yuri knew what it was like when Victor went out, there was no way Victor was going to be up and chipper.

Yuri took pleasure in the fact that Victor would at least have to suffer through the hangover, twenty-seven years of no deals wouldn't change after a single night of drunken debauchery, right?

Katsuki still seemed a bit let down as he laced up his skates. “Victor still isn’t here, huh?” he said. Maybe Yuri needed to win this competition to save Katsuki because this was Victor: flaky, unreliable, and would always do what he wanted without giving any consideration to others.

“They say he was out drinking until dawn,” Yuri said. “The dumbass.” Yuri stood, and started walking towards the rink because Victor or not, he was going to train, and he was going to win a gold on his senior debut.

“Oh, Yurio,” Katsuki said from behind him.

 _Don’t be weird and nice, don’t be weird and nice,_ Yuri prayed.

“What?” he said, turning around.

“Please teach me how to land a quad Salchow. Please!” the pig begged.

Well, that was unexpected. 

“Yeah, sure,” Yuri said. “Follow me.”

He hadn’t really been watching Katsuki attempt quads very much, so he didn’t really know what was going on, but by god he was going to be a better coach than Victor, who had proven time and time again to be more than useless.

“Watch me and then just do what I do,” he said, and he skated in a loop to get some momentum and then did a quad Salchow.

The pig tried and fell.

“You’re hesitating before you take off,” Yuri said. “Don’t think you’re going to fall, just jump.”

The pig tried again and fell.

“You’re leaning slightly when you take off, keep your core tighter!” Yuri said. “And kick off harder!”

The pig tried _again_ and fell. And he wasn’t even kicking off harder.

“You suck!” Yuri said. “Hey Katsudon! Watch me do it one more time!”

The doors banged open, and Victor’s voice rang across the rink. “Sorry I’m late!”

Oh god, this was the worst possible scenario. Yuri darted away as fast as his skates would take him. Not fast enough to escape Victor’s notice, though.

“Huh? What were you practicing just now?”

“Nothing!” Yuri shouted. “Are you finally going to coach us?”

He took a look at Victor, a proper look, and Victor looked _terrible_ , but there was no deal hanging over his head. Yuri let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

“Of course! Yurio, you first!”

Victor didn’t start music or anything, it was just a choreography run, but Yuri kind of liked that better. It meant that he couldn’t hide behind anything else to produce whatever emotion it was that Victor wanted him to see. Just him, the ice, and the fleeting memories of his grandfather coming to practice.

He didn’t have _agape_.

He didn’t have a soul.

But he had Dedushka. 

And that was enough.

(It had to be enough.)

___________________________________________

“So, what will you do for a costume tomorrow?” the drunk ballet teacher asked.

(Victor was drinking too. Yuri hadn’t been offered any, not that he would have accepted alcohol the night before a competition.) 

“Oh, I totally forgot!” the pig said.

“I didn’t bring anything either,” Yuri said. _If it makes you feel better._

“That’s taken care of!” Victor said, waving a hand. “I had them send all the costumes I’ve ever worn in competition from Russia!”

That was going to be an unholy number of costumes, and they would be lucky if they managed to find any that fit, but using logic on Victor was generally pointless. So Yuri was stuck digging through Victor’s old clothes while the pig oooohed and aaaahed, presumably reliving Victor’s old victories in his head.

“There are lots of stupid-looking ones,” Yuri said, because otherwise Victor was going to get his overinflated ego even worse, what with how Katsuki was treating him. Not that Victor would listen to him, but maybe Katsuki would catch on.

“Hey, you wore this one at the Grand Prix Final last year!” Katsuki said, completely oblivious. 

“Don’t pick anything flashier than mine!” Yuri snapped, because goddamnit he had an image to upkeep. Katsuki was too lost in memories, though. 

“This is from the Junior World Championship!”

“Oh, yeah,” Victor said. “I had long hair at the time, so my costume suggested both male and female genders at once.”

That had been before Yuri’s time, but he’d watched videos of it. It was a good program. Clearly, it had made an impression on Katsuki, because he was _glowing_ again in that stupid, innocent, _beautiful_ way that only Victor was supposed to be allowed to do. “I choose this one!” Katsuki said.

Katsuki ran off shortly after that, so Yuri tried on the couple of costumes he’d been eyeing, and went with the one that fit him best. Some white and silver one. He looked at Victor, but Victor was occupied with something on his phone, so he had nothing better to do other than return to his room. Which was in a closet.

Yeah, one way or another, he was going to be glad to leave Japan tomorrow.

___________________________________________

The morning was a blur. Yuri ate a little, he put on his costume, then his Russian team jacket over it, and was shoved in front of a camera to play nice for the media. Katsuki said something about tourism. He said something about not needing two Yuris, so he’d crush the other. Victor decided it wouldn’t be over the top at all to style himself Hasetsu’s new tourism ambassador, which at least Katsuki looked annoyed at too. Victor pretended to forget that he’d promised to coach the one that won this competition. 

They headed to the locker room to put on their skates and do their final stretches. Yuri tried to listen to his music, but he couldn’t concentrate, he kept glancing around instead. Yuuko came to fetch him, except apparently his costume was something that she knew and recognized because she was gushing all sorts of fluids again, and then she was saying, “You look really good in it! Good luck!” and the _sincerity_ in her voice cut—cut through the—the haze of it all (“O-okay,” he thought he responded) and then her hands were on his back and she was pushing him through the curtain and he stumbled out into the rink.

“Now, a champion with wins in the Junior Grand Prix Final and Junior World Championship, hoping for a brilliant senior division debut, with programs choreographed by Victor Nikiforov, Yuri Plisetsky!” 

The crowd was screaming for him, but for some reason, his heartbeat seemed louder than anything else in his ears. He waited for the music, waited for total silence to fall.

And then the music was playing, and he was moving.

It started out smooth, flowing. Like water. The waterfall—it was cold, on the ice. His costume was thin, thinner than he was used to. It was cold. Like the winters when he was younger. He let his arms—his whole body—rise, and fall, and his mind was mercifully blank.

“His first jump is a triple axel.” 

Silence. Cold. And then the satisfying, clean slice of his blades on the ice. He’d landed it perfectly, and applause from the audience followed him.

Next was the flying sit-spin. 

Then the spin in half-Biellmann position. That one always made him proud; barely anyone in the men's division could do it.

“We’re approaching the quadruples he was prohibited from performing in competition. Not to mention they’re in the second half of his program.” 

The quadruple Salchow and the triple toe loop, he could do them in his sleep. He glided across the rink, spun three times with one arm in the air, then—

”Here comes his final jump, a quadruple toe loop! He nailed it! What an astonishing fifteen-year-old! He nailed all his jumps!” 

The step sequence that was next—the movement of his arms, his back, his whole body—the rapid changes in direction—he could feel himself sweating, he could barely breathe, the lights were too bright—

 _Sorry, grandpa,_ he thought. _I’m too busy trying to skate the program to really think about agape at all._

The music was coming to its end—the music was finally, _finally_ coming to its end, and he threw himself into the last move, the combination spin, wishing for his humiliation and defeat to be over, feeling heavier and heavier as he straightened his back until finally the music left him and he was alone, hands clasped above his head, in silence.

The roaring applause from the audience hit him like a wave. It was everything he could do not to cry.

“Yurio!” came Victor’s voice from the edge of the rink. “That was the best performance I’ve seen from you so far!”

Yuri could see the happiness glowing off of him, that was the worst part. More than just amusement, for some reason, Victor _meant_ those words, meant them to the degree that his soul was lighting up. He was _genuinely_ proud of Yuri, proud like his grandfather would say in far fewer words when Dedushka could even watch. 

Fuck Victor for dangling affection in front of him when he fully intended to stay. And fuck Victor for taking everything he couldn't have and wrapping it up into a single program, a single word, and turning the ice against him too. Turning it into a place where he could never _win_ because every performance he gave would be an imitation of something he couldn't remember.

“Go on, greet the audience!” Victor shouted.

He put on his best blank face, outstretched an arm, and waited for it to be over. Then he hurried to the locker room to put his jacket on, so that he could catch Katsuki’s performance. Except he didn't even think that seeing the pig mess up would make him feel better.

Katsuki was nervous before the music started, although he hid it well. Yuri could see the black cloud darkening, bits and pieces of it trailing around him like he was being orbited by comets and dust. He skated beautifully, despite it, nearly pulling away again and again, but it weighed down on him.

When the step-sequence came—it was like the black cloud detached from him, was trailing slightly behind him, his footwork always keeping him an inch ahead, and then he was whipping around and _dancing_ with it. Dancing with an invisible partner that only Yuri could see, just for a moment, and then his quad Salchow came up and Yuri could see him overthinking it, _see_ the darkness overtake him again, and he stepped out, touched one hand down to keep his balance.

About what you'd expect.

Except he...pushed the darkness back and threw himself into the music even harder, his movements even smoother, more seductive. Victor must be proud of him. _Yuri_ was almost proud of him.

Yuri glanced at Victor's back, and gasped, small and silent.

Victor was glowing. Different than Yuri had ever seen before, softer, warmer. Yuri bet there were tears in his eyes, he was _glowing_. Not just with pride, but with something more. Something _deeper._

Victor was in love.

Suddenly, Yuri couldn’t stand to watch anymore.

(A part of him knew this was coming. The part of him that had packed his suitcase, and brought it with to the rink. The part of him that had booked his ticket back, without forcing Victor to book one too. But it still—still hurt that this was happening.)

Victor was in love, and Yuri was going to be alone again.

___________________________________________

He slipped out the rink, and it was empty outside. Quiet. No one to witness his shame.

"Yurio, hang on."

One person to witness his shame. He paused, but he didn't turn.

"You’re going back without even hearing the results?" Yuuko asked.

Victor was in love. And Yuri wasn’t a terrible enough person to want to take that away from him.

Besides, better to leave than to be left behind.

“I already know the results,” he said. “I’m going to keep training under Yakov. Later. Dasvidaniya.“

“I see,” Yuuko said.

“Don’t get me wrong! I’m the one who’ll win the Grand Prix Final!” Yuri said. “Tell him that!”

( _Tell him that I care about him too. Tell him that I better see him again. Tell him that he better be happy, that I want him to be happy._ )

He stalked off, and he didn’t look back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We have completed the Hot Springs on Ice arc, which means that things are finally ready to diverge from the precise dialogue and beats of the show. Thank you for reading so far! 
> 
> I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


	3. prima

Mila was waiting for him at the airport when he got back.

“I could have taken a taxi,” he grumbled. 

“ _Or_ , you could tell me all the details of everything that happened,” Mila said. “I get a single text from Victor a week ago, saying ‘did you know our Yura can see demon deals?’ and no replies to anything I sent back, had to stalk the two of you on Instagram to make sure that you were alive, and then watched you on television skating at Hot Springs On Ice, winning, and walking out before Victor couldn’t announce it.”

“I wouldn’t have won,” Yuri said. “Victor was looking for an emotion that I couldn’t produce.”

“So you gave up?” Mila said. “Yuri, that’s not like you!”

“So I’ll beat the pig in a competition where the judges haven’t traveled halfway across the world to fuck him!” 

“Yuri, are you _okay_?” Mila asked. Yuri hated the obviously concerned look she was giving him. “What happened over there?”

“Nothing,” Yuri said. “Leave me alone.”

“Can you really—“ 

“I’ll take a fucking taxi!”

“Alright, alright!” Mila grabbed his bag so that he couldn’t make good on his promise. 

Georgi was waiting for them in the car, loitering instead of having found a parking spot. Mila hoisted Yuri’s bag into the trunk, then Yuri slid into the back seat and very clearly put his headphones on. Mila sighed and took shotgun. It was about a twenty minute drive to the dorms, and Yuri found himself nearly nodding off. Mila got his bag from the trunk, which meant he had no choice other than letting her come up to his room with him.

“I fed Potya,” Mila said as she keyed in. “Georgi kept him company sometimes too. Your room is a dump.”

“Have you seen your own bathroom, hag?” Yuri shot back. Mila had an unholy amount of hair supplies and makeup that tended to sprawl across any available surface, and half the time spill all over everything, it was a hazard zone. At least his room wouldn’t kill anyone.

“Get dinner with us,” Mila said.

“I don’t want to fucking move, it’s two in the morning in Japan,” Yuri said.

“We’ll order takeout,” Mila said.

Yuri tried to fall asleep fast enough so that he wouldn’t have to eat takeout with Georgi and Mila, but Potya distracted him, so he wasn’t even pretending when Mila came back to his room to grab him. He shoved whatever he was given into his face, and reluctantly surrendered to Georgi’s attempts to get him to play Mario Kart. Apparently a new bundle had been released or something. This went on until Yuri started _actually_ falling asleep, when Mila shook him awake, helped him find pajamas from his suitcase, and then when he managed to convince her that he didn’t need her to dress him goddamnit, finally shoved her and Georgi out the door.

He fell asleep in the same clothes he’d flown in, pajamas forgotten on the side.

___________________________________________

Yuri woke up at 6am, which, considering the six hour time difference he didn't feel terribly groggy or like he needed to go back to sleep. He shoved his suitcase to the side and started going through warm-up stretches because he did _not_ have enough energy to go on a morning run. It wasn't until it was too late if he wanted to get to the rink on time that he realized that he hadn't taken a shower and probably looked and smelled disgusting.

Whatever. Give it an hour into practice and no one would be smelling like roses. 

When he got to the rink, everyone fell silent and stared at him, and he glared right back, until he realized that they were also staring at Yakov and this was a spectacle because everyone loved watching Yakov yell at someone who was not them. 

Yakov stopped in front of him, and looked him up and down. Yuri barred his chin, daring him to judge. 

"Everyone get back to practice!" Yakov shouted, never once looking away from Yuri. "What do you think we are, a bad TV drama?"

Yuri raised an eyebrow.

"You too," Yakov growled at him. "Let's see how much Victor disrupted your form with that impromptu vacation." 

"I still practiced every day," Yuri said. "Watch me, old man."

He stormed onto the ice, did some practice loops, and then executed a perfect quad Salchow just to spite anyone who dared think he was slipping. Being on the ice was nice. It was quiet. It helped clear his mind.

He would practice, more and more and more until no one could argue that he was the best. That he knew. That was familiar. That no one could take from him.

___________________________________________

Mila cornered him in the locker room when the day was done, and he grimaced, because it wasn’t going to be too easy to brush her off. She liked being in the know, and right now he was the biggest piece of gossip on the rink. Except talking to her would inevitably get personal because she had no sense of boundaries and decided that she was Yuri’s older sister or something, and Yuri didn’t want to get personal with anyone. He just wanted to skate, and then sleep, then rinse, repeat.

Mila would have none of that.

“Come on, we’re catching up the Russian way,” she said.

“What could have possibly given you the impression that I want to talk you with,” Yuri deadpanned.

“Because the Russian way involves alcohol, and you can’t buy it yet,” Mila said.

Now _that_ was tempting. Yuri had gotten drunk twice before, once on a dare with some of the junior skaters back when they'd still been willing tolerate him, and once when Mila had wanted to watch some really stupid movie with him and he'd jokingly said "only if you give me vodka." 

Mila took his silence for approval, because she looped an arm over his shoulder. "It'll be fun. Tomorrow's Saturday, which means the rink is booked for kids’ lessons and we get the morning off, so you can nurse your precious little hangover in peace."

He'd only gotten a hangover the second time with Mila, and only because she'd had a far larger supply of alcohol than the juniors did and thought it was funny not to warn him. Eight shots in, and he'd been a goner.

"We go shot for shot and question for question," Mila continued.

"Why the fuck would I want to ask you anything," Yuri said. 

"Let's see, while you were gone my boyfriend also got shown to the curb, the junior skaters have all interchanged who they're dating but you don't care about them, there are rumors of Yakov trying to get an Instagram to keep track of you, and aren't you curious about Georgi finding someone new?"

Shit. If Georgi had someone new, they'd inevitably break up, and Georgi would mope, and Mila would get tired of playing nursemaid and Yuri would be forced to play babysitter. 

"Fine," Yuri said. Mila _beamed_.

The dorms for the skaters that Yakov kept year-round were within walking distance of the rink, so it didn't take him and Mila particularly long to make it to the building. Mila was on the second floor, seniors got the better and _bigger_ rooms. Technically, Yuri should be able to move to the senior floor now, but Yakov hadn't said anything yet and he didn't want to ask and risk being assigned a roommate. Mila wasn't an option and Georgi had gotten an apartment years ago and there was no one else Yuri even bothered to talk to, not that rooming with either Georgi or Mila was acceptable.

"Alright, we're here, let's go, hag," Yuri said the moment Mila got the door open.

"There's borscht in the fridge," Mila said. "Drinking on an empty stomach will get you drunk faster!"

"Isn't that the point?" Yuri grumbled while Mila grabbed two bowls. "I'm not making small talk with you while I wait for you to finish dinner."

She raised an eyebrow and turned the television on. Yuri scarfed down his food so they could get this over with, and she took her precious time, watching him get more and more antsy out of the corner of her eye. So Yuri took out his phone and scrolled through Instagram to not give her the pleasure. Victor had posted some new pictures of him and the pig. Them on a train. _Time flies so fast._ A picture of Victor combing Yuuri’s hair that the triplets uploaded. 

Unwanted tears gathered in Yuri’s eyes. Victor had never helped him with his hair. He wiped them away furiously. Victor wasn’t allowed to touch his hair because Victor was a klutz. He’d probably pulled out half of the pig’s hair trying to do whatever he was trying to do with that comb.

“Are we drinking yet?” he complained. 

“Fine, fine,” Mila said. She cleared their plates too, which was probably why her room was not the deathtrap her bathroom was.

“So how does this game work?” Yuri asked when she got back.

“We each take a shot, then each ask each other a question?” Mila said. “Normal rules are you ask a question, I either answer it or take the shot, then we switch, but if we played by those rules you’d just get drunk and I’d learn nothing and this is good vodka, I’m not wasting it.”

“How expensive?” Yuri asked.

“That your question?” Mila said.

“No,” Yuri said. “Unless that’s your question. Either way it’s my turn, hag.”

Mila poured them both shots.

“So you and that hockey player are old news?” Yuri said.

“Caught him with another girl,” Mila said. “The poor darling, she had no idea. I nearly threw him out of a window. Turned out he was a complete wimp in a real fight. I think I'm done with guys for a while."

Yuri had no idea where in the world Mila learned to fight or how she’d gotten as strong as she was; she hadn’t had a troubled childhood or anything, and she’d done a bit of gymnastics before switching to ballet on the side besides figure skating, on the other hand, she had the most nonchalant reactions to making demon deals of anyone he had ever met. Yuri wouldn’t put it past her to trade her soul for a couple of hours just to strike the fear of god in the scumbag she’d been dating.

“My turn,” she said. “What did Victor mean by you can see demon deals?”

"That I can see demon deals," Yuri said.

"Physically?" Mila asked.

"That's another question," Yuri said.

“Spoilsport,” Mila said.

Yuri took a shot. "So does Georgi have anyone new?"

Mila took her shot. "Nope. Just said that to bait you here. How do you see demon deals?"

"Physically," Yuri said.

“Yuri!”

"Okay, okay!" Yuri said. "I physically see darkness hanging over people when they don't have their souls in their bodies. Why do you care?"

"Because it's cool?" Mila said. "So are you psychic? Oh, and take a shot."

“I…” Yuri paused. “I dunno.”

“Your turn,” Mila said. 

Fuck, Yuri actually didn’t have any more questions. Fuck, fuck, fuck— “Did you tell anyone else about Victor’s text?”

“Of course not, who do you think I am?”

“The biggest scandalmonger in the rink,” Yuri said. He took a shot. “You saw Katsuki and Victor at the banquet so you know that story, Victor left because he thinks he’s _in love_ , Katsuki doesn’t remember anything and half the time looks like he’s going to faint or explode what with how over-the-top Victor’s being, Victor forgot his promise to choreograph my senior debut but I still got a short program out of it, and I’ve been able to see demon deals since I was a little kid but didn’t tell anyone because I’m a freak enough already and Yakov would use me to police your dumb asses and then _everyone_ would hate me, is there anything else you need me for now that you’ve gotten all _possible_ interesting information that I know?”

Yuri got stupidly talkative when he was drunk, and tired, which, in hindsight, was probably the reason that half of the junior skaters originally had hated him. That and he was better than them.

“Hair, nails, and facemasks!” Mila said.

Yuri groaned, but he couldn’t refuse. Where the fuck Mila got her facemasks were a closely guarded secret, because they were the best fucking facemasks Yuri had ever seen, they’d leave his skin silky and perfect for _days_ , and he had a sneaking suspicion that Mila had correctly guessed that if he knew what brand they were he’d just buy them himself and she’d have one less thing to coerce him into hanging out with her. Not that he hadn’t tried buying as many different brands as he could, foreign ones too. But nothing could compare to Mila’s.

“You could have said facemasks in the first place and I would’ve come with you,” Yuri said. “Flying is hell on my skin.”

“And miss you spilling your guts?” Mila said. “Now that I know everything, can you stop avoiding me?”

It wasn’t fair, she wasn’t supposed to be this perceptive when they were both supposed to be drunk. Or at least tipsy.

“Will you stop acting like I’m going to break just because Victor left?” Yuri said.

Mila’s eyes flashed, and shit, this was probably what she was trying to get at.

“I _worry_ , Yura,” she said.

“Well fuck you, _Baba,_ ” he said, and stood to storm out, except oh god he didn’t get a facemask yet, and also, he was a little bit dizzy, so he plopped back down and mostly concentrated on making it look like it was on purpose.

The facemasks actually did feel really good, especially when he only-a-little-bit-on-purpose put Mila’s on her face at the strangest angle half in the hopes of he’d see the packaging as she got a new one, and half because the alcohol was actually kicking in, but she just went to the bathroom and applied hers herself. He got a picture of hers on sideways before she left, though, and consoled himself by uploading it to Instagram.

> **yuri-plisetsky** baba still won’t tell me where she gets her facemasks @mila-babi 

he captioned it. 

The likes and comments would come flooding in, especially because his rabid fans tended to get territorial, although they seemed to be mostly okay with Mila. The last time he’d complained about the facemasks and their mysterious origin, Yakov had gotten hundreds of them mailed to him at the rink, and Yuri hadn’t had to go shopping for months. Yakov had yelled at him about getting real sponsors, which, shit, would probably be a thing he’d have to worry about this season. 

Mila came out of the bathroom with a facemask on properly and several different shades of red nail polish in her hands. She tossed the brightest bottle to him. “I call it mankiller red,” she said.

Yuri wasn’t sure which man he was supposed to be killing, Katsuki or Victor, and Mila laughed and he realized he had probably said it out loud. They spread newspaper down on the floor because there was no way that this wasn’t going to end in disaster, and decided fairly quickly to only do one another’s toes because Yuri had spilled almost all of Mila’s remover the last time they’d had a beauty night, and late morning or not, they both understood the importance of appearances at the rink. At least to Yuri. Mila intimidated people enough that no one would question her.

Yuri was laughing about five minutes in at Mila’s truly abysmal attempts of keeping the polish on her nails, and Mila smiled, the first real smile of the night.

___________________________________________

The next morning wasn’t really hell because Mila had made sure that he’d drunk a reasonable amount of water this time, but he still woke up at 6am because of the time difference between St Petersburg and Japan. He took a shower and was _planning_ on unpacking his suitcase but ended up lying in bed instead, staring at the ceiling as Potya eventually claimed a spot on his chest. When his alarm went off for practice, he was actively grateful, because at least he’d have something to _do_ at the rink. He shoved his stuff into his bag and hurried out the door, not even caring that he’d be early. He could stretch.

There were still kids on the ice and the poor suckers who had to teach them, so Yuri settled for half-heartedly practicing vertical splits while he checked his phone. There was a text from Yuuko of all people, below one of the pictures that he’d taken with her and the triplets.

**Unknown Number**

> _Hi Yuri,_  
>  _I heard that the other Yuuri is producing his own FS program this year. They haven’t decided what the theme will be, but I guess he and Victor are choreographing it together._
> 
> _What about you? Have you decided what you will be doing for you FS program yet? I’m really looking forward to it!!!_
> 
> _It’s a little late but I’m sending you the pictures we took together at the rink that didn’t make it onto the triplets’ instagram. I hope you can visit again sometime!!!_

Huh. When he’d given her his phone number, he thought it was either going to get spammed by constant texts by the triplets, or that she’d been asking out of kindness to make him feel a bit more welcome. Not that she was actually going to text. He didn’t really think she’d be the type to scout him out for Katsuki, and Victor was both too arrogant and too _forgetful_ of his existence to ask. Also, she was being a fairly terrible scout if she was telling him what Katsuki was doing. Unless this was supposed to egg him into doing something stupid like fully produce his own free program? He saved her number into his phone, though, along with some of the kaomoji that she had shown him.

He was too lost in thought to notice Mila sneaking up on him from behind.

“Oh? Yuri, did you go to Japan to find a girlfriend?”

“No. Get off me, Mila,” he growled. Then, because he knew it would piss her off, “Are you horny because you dumped that hockey player? I wouldn’t put myself in that situation. I won’t get myself almost killed just for going on a date with another girl.”

There was a moment of the world spinning sideways and his feet were swept out from under him, and suddenly he was six feet in the air well above Mia’s head and he most _certainly_ didn’t squeal and was trying desperately not to scream. 

“I’ve been practicing lifts lately, too,” Mila said cheerfully.

“Let me down, hag!” Yuri screamed, not even caring what a scene they were making, because to be fair, he was _six feet in the air how was this even happening._

Mila did _not_ let him down. "I'm only three years older than you!" she complained. Unfortunately, she'd been loud enough (okay, if Yuri was being honest, _he'd_ been loud enough) to catch the attention of their dearest coach.

"Yuri, Mila," Yakov said, perpetually unamused. 

"Coach Yakov," Mila said, looking down or whatever because she still cared about Yakov's opinion of her but _still not putting him down_.

"Put me down already! Come on!" Yuri shouted.

"Are you two switching to pairs skating?" Yakov asked.

Mila put him down immediately. "S-sorry," she said. 

Yuri ran off to the rink because at least the ice hadn't betrayed him yet. Cold, clean, reliable. Until the other skaters got here and Yakov properly started practice, it was his. He needed to work on his step sequences. Those were supposedly the pig’s strength, so he had to get better if he was going to beat Katsuki at his own game. Over, and over, and over again he would practice, until he was perfect. That was all that mattered.

Until he was perfect.

___________________________________________

Yuri didn’t really notice when the rink went silent, but he did notice when Yakov called him from the ice to change into shoes and stand in front of a rather severe-looking woman with sharp cheekbones and sharper eyes.

“Who is this hag,” Yuri asked, ever eloquent and ever polite.

Neither the woman nor Yakov answered; she instead grabbed him by the chin, forced his mouth open, and inspected his teeth like he was a horse.

“No cavities.”

Then she turned his shoulders, gave him a slight push such that he instinctively grabbed the bar that most skaters used for stretching, and she hoisted his left leg into the air. He could do a vertical splits perfectly fine, but this—this was just uncalled for.

“Physically, he’s abysmal.” 

Yuri could feel his hackles raising. Abysmal? He was one of the most flexible skaters in men’s singles, the only one who could hold a half-Biellmann position at Yakov’s rink, and she was calling him _abysmal_?

“Do what you want,” Yakov said, the traitor. 

“What the hell?!” Yuri shouted, because still no one had told him what was going on, and he hadn’t come to the rink to be insulted, he’d come to practice.

“I will choreograph your free program,” the woman said, and Yuri’s mouth fell open. “But first, I’ve decided on your next goal. Become this season’s principle—“ she reached out and cupped his cheek, and Yuri didn’t even want to think about what his expression was doing in reaction to the unexpected gentleness, “—no, prima ballerina.” She looked ruthless, untouchable, frozen like stone as she looked down at him. “If you are willing to sell your soul to win.”

Yuri’s stomach dropped.

“P-Prima ballerina?” he could hear Mila say from the side.

Right. He had an audience. He couldn’t break down here. He took her hand off his cheek, and steeled himself as best he could. "If selling my soul is what it takes to win, I'll give you this body, no holds barred."

The woman didn’t quite smile, but Yuri still got the feeling she was doing the closest thing she could to smiling. She offered a hand, and he shook it.

“I am Lilia Baranovskaya,” she said. “Go home and pack up your things. You’ll be living with me from now on to practice.”

“Huh?” Yuri said, and Yakov did the same behind him, which was a bit relieving, because if Yakov was going to hoist him off onto this strange woman he’d expect at least a _bit_ of warning.

“With Yakov, too.”

“Lilia!” Yakov said, sounding completely scandalized. 

“Don’t get me wrong, Yakov, I don’t intend to get back together with you,” Lilia said, and Yuri found his heart sinking, because didn’t Yakov say just yesterday that this wasn’t supposed to be a bad TV drama, he and Yakov were moving in with what—Yakov’s ex-girlfriend? his ex-wife? while said ex trained Yuri to win the Grand Prix Final.

“What? I—I wasn’t hoping for that at all!” Yakov sputtered, and Yuri rolled his eyes and headed for the doors because he really did have packing to do, and he didn’t need to witness any more of this.

___________________________________________

Mila caught him before he was done packing, because his room _was_ a mess and Yakov would probably expect it to be clear for the next person who got to live there. 

Five years, he’d been with Yakov.

Not that he was leaving, not really. And he’d expected to move rooms, he wasn’t a junior skater anymore. Wasn’t like there was anything nice about _this_ room in particular. But it was _his_ , a little piece of something that was _his_ , and now he was expected to leave it behind in a moment.

When he’d sold his soul, it had been just that, his soul. Not his home. Not his room. Not everything he’d managed to collect as he pieced together a life far away from everything and everyone he knew. And it was stupid, but—none of Yakov’s other skaters ever had to do this. Suddenly upend their lives on some woman’s whim.

“Lilia is a legend,” Mila said, as if reading his thoughts. “Prima ballerina of Bolshoi Ballet for years. The most famous ballerina in the world, in her day. And then the most sough-after choreographer. She _never_ takes on new students. Yakov once tried asking her for me, she wouldn’t even come see me.”

“That supposed to mean anything to me?” Yuri said.

“It means that you can win, Yuri,” Mila said.

“So now I need a world-famous choreographer to compete with Victor?” Yuri snapped.

“You’re in quite the mood today,” Mila said.

“If you’re not going to help, get out,” Yuri said, and Mila acquiesced, and they finished packing in silence.

___________________________________________

Yakov drove him over to Lilia’s _mansion_ , which at least wasn’t terribly far from the rink, although it was a bit more than comfortable walking distance. Yuri spent the entire ride clutching a very ruffled-looking Potya, who settled down immediately when Yuri plopped him on the bed of the room Lilia pointed him towards. Lilia didn’t say anything about his cat, which meant she hadn’t banned his cat, which was good enough for him. Banning Potya would be a deal breaker.

There was a large room which doubled as a ballet studio on the first floor, which, Yuri supposed, if one was a ballet-legend-turned-choreographer and was going to have such a large house, was the obvious thing to install. Lilia informed him that he was allowed to use it at any hour of the day or night, and heavily implied that she expected him to practice several hours a day on his own time to drill in all that she taught him. She informed him that he would be put on a very strict diet, although all meals taken with her were acceptable, and that his physical training regime as a skater was acceptable. 

And then she told him to go to bed, because she was getting him up at 5:00am the next day to get ballet lessons in before skating.

___________________________________________

The thing was, it wasn’t that Yuri _liked_ Lilia so much that he respected how utterly terrifying the woman could be, respected how everyone else acted around her, and it made him want to earn _her_ respect like nothing he’d ever felt before. So he listened to her, and he didn’t talk back.

“No, no, no! Not like that at all!” she’d say during ballet practice. “Throw yourself away! Your past self is dead! People who can be reborn as many times as necessary are the strong ones!”

He could understand that, he it was the sort of...it was the sort of coaching he could understand, instructions that he could obey, he could throw himself away over and over until he was reborn into something new.

“It’s not good at all! Even the king crab we ate yesterday had a better free leg than you,” she’d say as she’d watch him on the rink, not even caring that he’d doubled over panting because he hadn’t had a break in what felt like hours. “Do it again, starting from the same place.” As if she was looking for weakness. “Your response?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Yuri said, because he knew winning. Winning meant sacrifice. 

Yuuko was the only one he let himself talk to about any of this, because she was off in Japan and couldn’t tell anyone so there was no risk of it getting back to Lilia. It had only been two weeks, and he didn’t…he liked Lilia’s choreography. He liked how she was willing to push. To ask things of him that no one else ever bothered thinking he was capable of. Yuuko was just...surprisingly easy to talk to, and sometimes he needed to vent. And she, in turn, kept him informed of what the pig was doing, so it was useful.

There was plenty to vent about. Lilia scolded him constantly, _and_ Yakov constantly, the latter would be funny if it weren’t for the fact that the two seemed…so familiar with each other. Like they were used to existing in the same space. That it was _easy_ to exist in the same space again. It disconcerted him.

Lilia took him out to fancy restaurants all the time, insisted that part of being a prima ballerina was knowing how act _composed_ , like he owned the world. She took him to shows put on by Bolshoi Ballet, they’d have their own box, and sometimes they would watch silently, and sometimes she would point out all the dancers’ flaws to him.

“The world will always be watching to tear you down,” she told him. “So you tear yourself down, and you learn to be better. _That_ is how you become prima ballerina.”

So he worked hard. He ate what she told him to eat. He didn’t snap when she was around, and he didn’t breathe a word of complaint.

___________________________________________

He was getting better. Lilia would praise him as much as she would criticize him, now. But he didn't need to hear it from her, he could tell from the stares of the other skaters. He was used to the envy and bitterness that came from his form, his abilities; it had followed him with his youth his whole career. Just not as much from Yakov's seniors, before. Mila's gaze was thoughtful, and sometimes appreciative. Which made sense; she would never have to compete against him. It was equally as intense, though.

"Show me some of the ballet she's been teaching you?" she asked him one day, when he didn't immediately have lessons after his rink time.

"Why?" he asked.

"Because your eyes look sad," she said, and Yuri understood. There was breaking involved in rebuilding. Skaters' hearts were made of glass.

"Besides," she continued. "You're not a floor up anymore, there's no one to bother when I get bored."

He was being trained by her childhood idol, that much he'd managed to pick up on. But at least she had the courtesy never to look jealous to his face.

"Sure," he said. Not at all because he missed Mila too.

___________________________________________

He hadn’t quite fallen asleep on the couch, but it was close. He’d been practicing in the studio for two and a half hours after dinner, and taken one look at the stairs before deciding that maybe he could rest his feet for a couple of minutes before trying them. And then resting his feet had turned into propping his feet up which had turned into him sliding into a sprawl on the couch and sliding out of consciousness.

There was a hand brushing aside the hair on his forehead, and he kept very, very still.

"Is it hard?" came Yakov's voice from across the room.

"Hard?" Lilia repeated from over him.

"This is what we...it sometimes feels like what we could have had. Do you feel it too?"

Lilia laughed. "You never wanted children, Yakov. Neither did I."

"Yuri has never been just any child, though," Yakov said.

The hand resumed brushing back his hair. "Yes," Lilia said softly. "Yes, it is hard. Sometimes, when the light is right, it almost seems like he has my eyes." 

"We should wake him up," Yakov said. "He'll get sore if he sleeps on the couch." 

The hand on his hair stopped, then moved down to his shoulder and shook him gently. "Yuri."

Yuri groggily opened his eyes.

"When you need to sleep, you sleep in your bed," Lilia said. "Your body is your weapon, you hone it, and then you store it safely when it is not in use."

Yuri decided not to answer, just stumbled toward the stairs in obedience. 

_You never wanted children, Yakov. Neither did I._

Potya was waiting for him on his bed, dear, reliable Potya.

_Yuri has never been just any child, though._

Of course not, he was Yakov's star skater. He was going to be better than Victor ever was. He wasn't a child, he'd never been a child.

_Yes. Yes, it is hard. Sometimes, when the light is right, it almost seems like he has my eyes._

Lilia was about the furthest thing from a mother figure that he could imagine. But then again, he was the last person that anyone would want as a son.

Maybe it did hurt, this semblance of what could have been, like they were playing family instead of playing to win. 

He would win. He had to win. It was the only way to guarantee that they wouldn't go away too.

___________________________________________

When the Grand Prix assignments came in, Yuri (rather embarrassingly, but at least only to Yakov and not where Mila could tease him about it), demanded to know where the pig had been assigned before he bothered checking his own assignments. 

(Cup of China and Rostelecom Cup for the pig. Skate Canada and Rostelecom Cup for him.)

The reality that he was going to be competing soon set in, so he practiced harder. Longer. Let it all seep into his bones.

He had become the prima ballerina. Let the piggy try to beat him _now_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


	4. debut

Yuri _wasn't_ freaking out the night before Skate Canada. He _wasn't_. 

Yakov and Lilia had both come with him, which made sense, his coach and his choreographer, they should be there at his senior debut. Not that this—was the competition that mattered. It was the Grand Prix Final that was important to win.

He'd just never considered that he might not _qualify_ before.

His phone buzzed.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _Good luck on your debut tomorrow! I know you'll be great!_

Of course Yuuko would text him.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _We're having a watch party because we can't cheer you on in person this time!_

A—

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _a watch-party?_
> 
> _of course! Me, Takeshi, the triplets, Minako, and Mari will all be there!_
> 
> _Mari? As in Katsuki's sister?_
> 
> _Yes! You're our favorite skater, besides Yuuri, of course. Minako and Mari are looking at tickets for the Grand Prix Final, I'll help them make banners for you!_  
> 

That was....a strange feeling. No one had ever made banners for him. Well, the stupid Yuri's Angels fanclub did all the time, but no one he _knew_ ever made banners for him to cheer him on. Of course, Minako and Mari would only go if Katsuki made it to the Final, but still, they didn't have to. Yuri had made no pretense about his derision for their dear Katsudon, at this point it had been played up publicly far more than he actually felt, and they _still_ would be cheering for him.

A really strange feeling.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _Does Minako know that Lilia Baranovskaya choreographed my free skate?_
> 
> _Yes!!! She keeps up with skating news!!! She met Lilia once when she was on tour in Russia, and she says she thinks your free program will be incredible and very much looks forward to seeing it. We all do! Agape too. Have you changed any elements?_

ISU requirements dictated that a men's single short program had to include a double or triple axel, any triple or quad immediately preceded by steps, a jump combination, a flying spin, a spin combination with a change of foot, a camel or sit spin with a change of foot, and at least one step sequence. Victor had given him all the required elements for Hot Springs On Ice, even though it hadn't been any sort of sanctioned competition.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _Yakov and I haven't talked about it, and Lilia's been mostly concentrating  
>  on how I move and my free skate, not messing with elements. _
> 
> _Besides, Victor is an okay choreographer I guess._

That was really all he had to say. Except...Yuuko had been pretty trustworthy. Yuri could probably tell her stuff. And he wanted to brag a bit.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _I've been working on entering my jumps with raised arms to increase the difficulty._
> 
> _I still can't land them regularly enough to use in competition._
> 
> _Not that I'm bad at them!_
> 
> _I can land them more than half the time!_
> 
> _I'll probably unveil it at the Grand Prix Final._

Oh god, he'd made a total fool out of himself.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _It's okay, Yuuri doesn't like to do anything unless he has it perfect too. He was always like that as a kid. I look forward to seeing them in the Grand Prix Final! I won't tell anyone, so it will be a surprise!_

That was...Yuri was glad that she wouldn't tell anyone, even though he'd decided that she wasn't scouting him out weeks ago. And it was nice to hear how wholeheartedly sure she was that he would make it to the Grand Prix Final.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _You haven't changed your costume for Agape, have you? You looked so beautiful in it!_

Yuri wondered if she was still talking to him to make him feel better. If she even knew how _definitely not_ nervous he was because he was Yuri Plisetsky and he never got nervous especially not when he was going to crush everyone and was just...restless because the time difference meant that his sleeping schedule was messed up and he just wasn’t tired yet.

Although it was making him feel better.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _I got it taken in on the hips a bit because Victor was wider than me as a junior, but I'm keeping it._
> 
> _My free skate costume is really cool. It's black and has red and pink flames wrapped around. Lilia let me help design it._

He bit his lip.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> [image sent]
> 
> _from right after the fitting_
> 
> _Oh my god it's so gorgeous!! It suits you really well! Can I show it to everyone?_
> 
> _who's everyone?_
> 
> _Minako and the triplets right now. We're working on banners for Cup of China._  
> 

That didn't seem too bad.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _okay, but nobody can say a word about it or post it online.  
>  Lilia said I'm not supposed to reveal it before the competition._
> 
> _Of course! Our lips are sealed! Thank you so much for sharing it with us!_
> 
> _Minako says she loves it, it really brings out the color in your eyes!_  
> 

He’d mostly loved the dark shades and the mesh on his left arm and back and how the flames seemed to crawl off him, consuming him. He’d told Lilia that he didn’t want his image this season to be some stupid innocent cherubic angel or anything, especially not because his short program was already _Agape_. He wanted to be dangerous too.

Dangerous was certainly one way to describe _Allegro Appassionato_ , it was _fast_ , intense, and the measures switched regularly from 3/4 to 4/4 or 6/8, which meant that his timing had to be perfect and he couldn’t lose his concentration even for a second. He could do it, of course, just Lilia didn’t go easy on him at all, she played his strengths but she also expected _better_.

 _Allegro Appassionato_ and _Agape_ were the most difficult programs he had ever performed, a whole class above anything he’d done as a junior. Which made sense, he was a senior now. Still, even _Agape_ was technically harder than the short program Victor used for his senior debut season.

Not that Yuri had any trouble with any of the technical elements. Just—

Okay, he was a bit nervous for his first senior competition.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _hey, do you guys have any tips for falling asleep?_
> 
> _the time difference is messing with me._

Surely the pig had trouble sleeping before competitions too, so they’d probably know some tricks.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _I usually drink a glass of warm milk?_
> 
> _Minako says if you press on the little cavity where your eyebrows meet the top of your nose for a minute, it helps you relax and sleep._
> 
> _It’s nearly 11 for you, isn’t it? I shouldn’t keep you up much longer._
> 
> _If I don’t get to say this again before tomorrow, good luck, Yurio! Davai!_

God, they were all so…stupidly nice. It wasn’t fair. And for some reason they’d decided to be nice to him too.

(Minako’s tip did help, he fell asleep after tossing and turning for about twenty minutes, which was infinitely better than he expected.)

___________________________________________

Yuri was scheduled second for the short program. 

His competitors were Jean-Jacques Leroy, nineteen years old, last year’s Grand Prix bronze medalist who was skating on his home turf to boot, Michal Březina, twenty-six, and Emil Nekola, eighteen, from the Czech Republic, Daniel Samohin, who was also eighteen, from Israel, and Misha Ge, twenty-five, from Uzbekistan. 

Not that age mattered. Not that Yuri would let the fact that he was fifteen stop him.

First up was Misha Ge. Yuri waited in the locker room, kept his earbuds in and listened to _Agape_ over and over although sometimes notes from an electric guitar filtered in. Ge got a black leather costume, the top half bedazzled with sparkling silver studs, and normally Yuri would be jealous except right now he just felt like he wanted to throw up.

Halfway through the song, Yakov came to get him, to get ready for his own turn. Yuri kept his earbuds in and tried to keep his concentration on his own performance, but he couldn’t help but glance up every once in a while. Ge’s step sequences were nowhere near as good as Katsuki’s, nor was his body as _expressive_. He ended with a combination spin that was nowhere near as artistic or clean as Yuri knew his own could be.

Mila said that he should have beaten Katsuki in Hot Springs On Ice. He’d only gotten better since.

He could do this. He _had_ to do this.

He was on the ice. His thoughts faded, mercifully; he was a blank slate as the first angelic notes echoed across the stadium.

_People who can be reborn as many times as necessary are the strong ones._

The movements were so much easier, the _flow_ was so much easier, with the feeling of invisible hands on his back and shoulders, ghosts of Lilia correcting his posture. The moments that he tilted his chin upwards, it wasn’t the greed that Victor had originally scolded him on. It was faith. It was the _dignity_ that the prima ballerina must always carry, that he had learned to carry. His arms soared in and out, painstakingly positioned and yet flowing so freely.

Onto the triple axel. 

He nailed it, and for the first time, screams from the audience burst into his bubble of quiet.

The flying sit spin came next, which was great, his spins were one of his strengths. He switched from his left to his right leg on the ice, lifted the left above his head to finish the spin in half-Biellmann position.

Then he was off.

Leaning down then swooping up then a turn and stop—perfectly poised—and four quick steps forward, then he whirled off, prima ballerina, queen of all he could see.

His mind was clear once more as he approached his first combination jump, the quad Salchow into the triple toe loop. He could feel it as he danced across the rink, he was starting to tire, but his expression never faltered. The prima ballerina could let no weakness show. He whipped around three times, the perfect pirouette, then two long, flowing steps, then the last quad, the quadruple toe loop—

(He didn’t pick up as much height as he’d wanted, but he got all the rotations in and he landed it cleanly.)

Then the step sequences, the darting back and forth with flourishes of his arms and unforgiving changes of direction; this was where Lilia’s guidance helped him the most. He could dance it in his sleep now, he didn’t have to concentrate so hard on getting all the motions right, he let his thoughts drift instead to his grandfather. How Dedushka would watch all of his practices. How Yuuko and the others were watching right now. That could—that could be enough to bluff his way through _agape_ , he had fooled Victor before. He could fool Victor again.

(Not that he dared hope that Victor was watching.)

And then it was his last element, the combination spin. A sit spin, first, bending inwards and downwards to maximize his momentum, then a camel as he stood into a catch-foot layback reaching towards the sky, down again into the broken leg sit-spin position, and then he could finally straighten, bringing both hands clasped in a prayer position above his head.

He gasped as the music faded, trying to get more air into his lungs, and the audience was screaming, and…

It didn’t feel like a revelation.

It didn’t feel that different from Juniors, honestly.

He’d gone out. He’d performed just fine. He hadn’t made any mistakes.

He met Lilia’s eyes where she stood across the rink and she tilted her chin up, a tiny act of approval. He smiled. If it had been good enough for her, then he’d been good enough.

___________________________________________

Yakov gave him his phone after the Kiss And Cry. He'd gotten 99.02 points, which put him ahead of Ge at 72.30. Quite far ahead. It was a personal best, too, but that wasn’t a particularly comparison, seeing as none of his junior programs had allowed quads. 

Emil Nekola, the younger of the Czechs, was skating next, but he could pick apart the competition later, right now he wanted to let his stomach settle. The phone was a nice distraction, now that skating was done. 

He flicked through his notifications, and saw the text immediately,

**baba yaga**

> _Call me RIGHT NOW!!!_

which, considering how often Mila used all caps (never), made Yuri suspect that someone had died. He sighed, because shouldn’t this be Yakov’s problem to deal with, and hit call.

Immediately, he was accosted by a ridiculous amount of high-pitched screaming, and not just from Mila, which meant that the rink was probably on fire and it was _clearly Yakov’s problem_ when Mila’s voice rang out across it all with a sharp, “Shut up, guys! Yuri, you’re on speakerphone.”

“Why am I on speakerphone?” Yuri asked.

“Me and Georgi and some of the new junior skaters—“ (ones that hadn’t met him yet, so had only heard stories of how terrible he was, no doubt) “—wanted to wish you congratulations! We were all watching, that was incredible!”

“Yeah, obviously, tell Georgi he’s going to have tough competition because I’m not just coming for him,” Yuri said.

“Oh really?” came Georgi’s voice.

“I’m coming for Victor’s records this season,” Yuri said. “So unless you think you can beat those, you’ll be left behind in the dust.”

Mila laughed. “Good to see you’re your old arrogant self still. Setting a good example for all the juniors.”

“If any of them are using me as an example they’re doomed already,” Yuri said. “Glad to hear you’re all having fun, though.”

“We wanted to wish you congratulations,” Mila said.

"Thanks," Yuri said. "I should probably go, um, interviews."

"We'll be watching!" Mila said. 

(Of course she would be watching, she loved it when he snapped at people and made a scene.)

Yakov was holding off the reporters when Yuri slunk to his side.

"Yuri, _YURI_ ," shouted one of them immediately, shoving a microphone into his face. "What does it feel like making your senior debut so early? Most skaters wait until they're 16 or 17 to compete in the upper division, what caused you to choose to at 15?"

"Because I can," Yuri said. "I should have been able to last year, but Yakov wouldn't let me."

"You're not nervous about competing against adults?" another asked.

 _Doesn't seem like much of a competition yet,_ Yuri wanted to say, but he knew that Lilia would scold him, so he settled for, "I've been training for this my whole life, and I've often trained with senior skaters. Skating against them really doesn't seem that different."

"How do you feel about Victor Nikiforov—“

"Victor threw his career away," Yuri snapped. "I'm building my own right now. And I'll do it by winning gold in the Grand Prix Final!"

"If you—“

"Alright, enough questions," Yakov said. "We have some things to go over, then want to watch the other skaters."

Yuri was trembling with rage as Yakov led him away.

"You're going to get a lot of comparisons to Victor this season," Yakov said in a low voice. "You both started young, you come from the same rink, and you took the skating world by storm. They know he was training with you before he left for Japan. You just skated the program he choreographed, in one of his old costumes. They can tell there is a story there, they will ask about it. You cannot lose it every time someone mentions his name."

"I'm not the next Victor Nikiforov!" Yuri hissed. "And maybe they should—"

His phone buzzed.

**baba yaga**

> _oh my god you're growing up, you didn't yell at or insult anyone_

Fuck Mila.

It buzzed again.

**Yuuko (❀◦‿◦) (シ_ _)シ**

> _Agape was so beautiful! The triplets ran around screaming so long they almost missed Emil's short program! I don't think they're going to stop talking about it for days! You were so expressive, Yurio! Minako says she can see Lilia's influence in how you're more aware of your free leg when you jump, and that your step sequences are tighter, and Mari says that she's making Yuuri watch it as soon as he gets back from the rink._  
> 

The pig…hadn’t been watching. Well. It wasn’t like Yuri cared. They hadn’t talked at all since Yuri left Japan. The pig didn’t have Yuri’s phone number. Hell, Yuri hadn’t said goodbye. It wasn’t like—sure, Yuri had watched him compete in the Japanese Nationals because he hadn’t seen Katsuki’s free skate yet, and it hadn’t even been that good, it was—

He switched over to Instagram. The first thing on his feed was posted by Victor, of course, because apparently Yuri could never escape his influence. It was a picture of Katsuki, of course, because that was all Victor cared about anymore. Katsuki leaning forward on a bench, eyes wide, clearly entranced by something, with his hands clasped under his chin.

> ♥ **892 likes**
> 
> **v-nikiforov** watching Yurio make his official senior debut!!! so proud!!! _#theygrowupsofast_
> 
> View all 102 comments.

“I’m done with this, you keep it,” Yuri said, and shoved his phone at Yakov. No phones during competitions was supposed to be the rule anyway. He didn't know why Yakov had given it to him in the first place, but he certainly didn't want it now.

___________________________________________

After Emil came the Canadian, Leroy, Yuri heard that he wrote his own music or something, but he messed up one of his jumps, so he only got 95.56. He heard over the loudspeaker that Samohin was performing next, and hurried over to the stands to watch. Samohin had been up there on the podium with him last year at Junior World’s, the silver to Yuri’s gold, and even though they hadn’t really interacted, Samohin had skated a brilliant free program there to make up for ranking ninth after the short program, which Yuri could admire. 

He caught everything but the first thirty seconds of Samohin’s performance, and the man knew how to move his body with the music like there was _weight_ to it better than any of the juniors Yuri had competed against, and his spins were incredibly tight and fast, but he kept overbalancing his jumps.

Still—the way Samohin moved with such carefully controlled tension, the _sophistication_ and _maturity_ without turning to sex for appeal like they could now do in senior division—how he’d jumped into his last spin—

Yuri could respect it. He could respect that Samohin deserved to be here. He’d beat Samohin before and he would beat him again. And, considering Samohin got 74.62, that shouldn't be too hard. No way he was bouncing back enough to surpass Yuri.

Michal Březina, the other Czech, skated next. He was wearing a suit with an untied bowtie (what was it with untied bowties, Samohin wore one too with his burgundy top and dress pants, was there a memo in senior division for untied bowties that Yuri had missed?). Yuri was cultured enough to recognize Frank Sinatra as the music rang out throughout the rink. Březina’s motions were smooth, and matched the music quite well. His first jump was clean, but he stumbled on the second, the combination jump. Yuri’s attention wandered before the second half of the program, because somehow listening to Frank Sinatra always made him sleepy.

Yakov ushered him out of there as soon as possible, gave him some food, and sent him to his hotel room to sleep. For once, Yuri didn’t argue. He was gone before his head hit the pillow.

___________________________________________

There was a rather pervasive rumor that people without souls did not dream.

Yuri knew this rumor to be false because he, in fact, could dream just fine.

This dream started with the notes of _Allegro Appassionato_ trickling through Yuri’s mind, and on instinct, his body moved into its first pose, left arm reaching towards the sky, right leg back and perfectly horizontal, and right arm reaching forward as he leaned to counterbalance. It flowed immediately into a loose spin, then leaning down, reaching out, and back up, arms towards the sky as he brought his feet into a charade of ballet's first position. Lilia’s choreography for him was so _circular_ , spiraling round and round, his arms and torso transitioning between motions Lilia had carved into him. He was approaching the first jump, a quad Salchow, when—

He tumbled across the ice instead of landing.

That…that _never_ happened to him. The Salchow was _his_ jump, it was the quad he’d landed in competition when he was twelve, he could do it in his sleep, why couldn’t he—

He resisted punching the ice, instead pushed himself angrily to his feet, and then looked around, because this wasn’t the stadium he was supposed to be performing in. It was the Ice Castle of Hasetsu, and the pig was staring at him. He recognized the light, recognized the pig’s expression, this was the morning that the pig had asked him to teach him how to land the Salchow.

“You suck!” came out of his mouth robotically, and it felt like he wasn’t saying it. “Hey Katsudon! Watch me do it one more time!”

He turned, skated in a small loop to pick up some speed, kicked off, and—

went sprawling to the ground.

“No, like this!” Yuri said.

He tried again and fell again. 

“I swear I can—“

He fell again.

He was panicking, oh god, why couldn’t he do the jump, he leaned into it again, a perfectly clean takeoff, all the proper rotations and he _should_ have been coming down perfectly when—

He was on his ass again, on the ice. And he _knew_ it was a dream and he couldn’t feel the real hurt anyways but he still ached and he couldn’t hold it in any longer, he started crying, sobbing, out of _frustration_ , because he was never this incompetent, he never missed his jumps.

The pig skated over to him silently, and offered him a hand.

___________________________________________

Yuri stood arms out to the side, head titled slightly to the right, and right leg poised as he waited for the cheers to fade out and the music to fade in. _Allegro Appassionato_ began to play, and immediately he turned, his right leg swept out, arms up and out, and he was dancing across the ice.

Lilia told him that she’d based his choreography a bit on the Firebird ballet, but that she’d wanted him to find two sides of himself in the dance. The first was a beautiful, mythical creature, a prized possession to anyone who could catch him, pursued through the woods by the finest of princes, a life spared only because he was too beautiful to die. There had to be allure in all of his moves, the sort of grace that no one hunting him down would hurt him for fear of him stopping. 

But the other emotion, the other story she asked him to tap into was the opposite: a fire demon, a creature of darkness and flame, one powerful enough to blaze through everything in its path. Not malevolent. Just unstoppable. But the single rule of fire is that it must burn, and if he stopped moving, even for a second, he would be extinguished. 

He reached the quad Salchow and executed it perfectly. 

A quick circle of the ice to gain momentum, and then he moved immediately into his next jump, a triple axel from a spiral. 

There were two more jumps in the first half, a triple Lutz and a triple flip, which he executed skillfully between Lilia’s choreography. His feet moved in and out of the ballet positions, quick and precise, the motions comfortable in their familiarity. Some skaters brought ballet training with them to the ice, but no one ever did ballet on the ice. Not like this. 

Then the music slowed. The second half. He was rapidly tiring.

There were four jumps in the second half. The first was a quadruple toe loop. He clenched his teeth and threw himself into it— _keep moving or you die_ —and cheers met him as he landed it perfectly. 

The sequence of steps that came next was far slower, he got to glide across the rink in half-Biellmann position, time enough to catch his breath. His back was so much straighter than before as he held his leg above him from behind, Lilia was right, he had been in abysmal physical condition before she started training him. But not anymore. Now, he was prima ballerina.

Then he picked up, skating faster, and threw himself into the quad Salchow, triple toe loop combination—he wobbled a bit on the landing, barely noticeable, but he bit the inside of his cheek in frustration. He should be better than this.

The triple loop, double toe loop—goddamnit, he wasn’t supposed to be tired, he could do this, the Firebird couldn’t falter as it was hunted, couldn’t show any weakness, the fire couldn’t stop burning or it would die—

Triple axel, single loop, triple Salchow, and he landed it perfectly—

Into the combination spin—

and then the music wound down and he stepped out of it, drew his body back together into his final position, arms open, and held his breath.

(After all, a prima ballerina couldn’t be seen panting, couldn’t look affected.)

He had done it. He had performed it _perfectly_. He’d already had such a good lead on the others, he skated to the edge of the rink, met Lilia and Yakov for the Kiss and Cry, let Lilia drape his Team Russia jacket over his shoulders and zip it up, had leaned back in his chair and drew his knees in as he got his score—193.79—he was _miles_ ahead of everyone else.

Gold felt different in senior division. It felt a lot more satisfying.

___________________________________________

Gold went to the annoying, infuriating, absolute _hack_ of a skater named _Jean-Jacques Leroy_ , who was so fucking pretentious that they needed two first names hyphenated together anyway?

Yuri stood on the podium, trembling, holding a silver medal (no wonder Lilia hadn’t looked happy after his free skate, she could tell, she could always tell), when JJ turned to him, and said to him in a sickeningly sweet voice, “Let’s climb the podium together again at the Rostelecom Cup, Yuri-chan.”

What the _fuck_ was up with calling him Yuri-chan? Was it supposed to be a reference to the fact that Yuri had run off to Japan? Yuri wanted no form of connection whatsoever with Japan, no connection with Victor, no connection with the pig, and he _certainly_ didn’t need this asshole rubbing into his face that he’d lost and might lose again.

Four quads in his program. That was how he’d done it. _Four. Fucking. Quads._

It took everything Yuri had not to break into tears, or deck the asshole in the face, knock him off the podium for good, but he did neither.

Yakov and Lilia came to collect him afterwards. Lilia took one look at his face, and said, “No interviews,” and Yakov took care of it. It helped that Yuri had spoken to reporters after his free program while _Jean-Jacques_ had been blowing his scores out of the water, so really, there wasn’t much more that he needed to say unless someone wanted to ask “how do you feel about winning second instead of first,” which was the exact question that neither Lilia nor Yakov wanted him to be asked.

“Go shower, and change into a nice suit,” Lilia ordered him in the lobby of the hotel. “We are going out to a nice dinner to celebrate.”

Yuri was too tired to argue.

He did feel a bit better after a shower. He’d packed nice clothing, specifically because he’d gotten used to Lilia’s tastes for ridiculously expensive food, and the restaurant she’d chosen did not disappoint. As in, it was a fucking _castle_. A _cathedral_. With _stained glass windows_ and everything.

He snapped a picture to get both one of the chandeliers and the stained glass, and tapped to upload it to Instagram,

> **yuri-plisetsky** can’t believe we’re getting dinner in a literal castle _#LaCastile #Mississauga #Canada_

before putting his phone in his pocket. Lilia raised an eyebrow at him.

“I post on social media a lot,” he mumbled. “It would be weird if I didn’t. Gotta keep up appearances.” 

“Chin up,” Lilia said. “You did well today.”

Yuri tried to keep his chin up. Beside him, Yakov was fiddling with his napkin, looking very uncomfortable in the suit that he kept around for banquets. Yuri wasn’t quite sure if it was because Yakov felt like some sort of an awkward third wheel to Lilia’s apparent appropriation of Yuri as her newly claimed protégé, or if because the menu was so laughably out of his price range. Lilia ordered the platter for two, and Yakov got the cheapest steak on the menu.

Yuri had to admit, he didn’t mind Lilia’s preference for seafood that much, as he picked at the steamed vegetables from the platter for two. He’d been sticking to Lilia’s diet mostly because he didn't have anything better to do and would eat what was stuck in front of him, but rich foods had been bothering him a bit lately. There was filet mignon on the platter, and he took a bit of that, leaving all the crab legs for Lilia.

“When we get back to Russia, you will take a day off to rest. Recuperate,” Lilia said. “Then we will train even harder.” 

He nodded, not really trusting himself to say anything. Lilia—she’d only known him for a few months, but sometimes it was uncanny how much she could see through him. Getting silver here wasn’t—he wasn’t going to throw a tantrum, or treat it like it was some kind of cheap fluke. At fifteen years old, for a senior debut, he was doing _fantastic._

But he wanted to be more than impressive for his age. He wanted to _win_.

He didn’t want congratulations. He didn’t want condolences. He wanted to sell his blood, sweat, and tears, his heart and his mind, everything he had left, until he was on the top of the podium. Lilia saw that in him, saw what he was willing to _sacrifice._

He had promised her everything but his soul, had he not?

___________________________________________

He meant to…catch up with Mila, or call his grandfather, or something on his day off, but instead, he couldn’t get out of his bed.

Lilia took one look at him the next day and asked, “Do you want another day to rest?”

It wasn’t a test; he knew her well enough by now to know that if she was offering in the first place, she meant it.

“No,” he gritted out.

She didn’t say anything, but she smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The picture that Yuri uploaded would look something like [this](http://lacastile.com/images/gallery/g6.jpg). La Castile is a real restaurant. The platter for two is C$160.
> 
> It bothered me that we only saw three skaters in _Yuri!!! On Ice_ at Skate Canada to attempt to write a proper description of it for this chapter, so I looked for competitors to add. There are twelve skaters that are mentioned in canon throughout to be in the Grand Prix Series, and tallying it up all of them are assigned to precisely two events, so there weren't canon characters I could reassign. I chose to follow in the structure of the show, and only have six skaters mentioned competing. Michal Březina, Daniel Samohin, and Misha Ge were the fourth, fifth, and sixth place finalists in the 2016 Skate Canada International event. All description of their programs and costumes came from videos of the actual event. If you’d like to visually picture how the event went, Yuri, JJ and Emil's programs can be seen in the Rostelecom Cup (Episodes 8 and 9), and the Grand Prix Final (Episodes 11 and 12) for Yuri and JJ. Michal, Daniel, and Misha's programs can be seen here:
> 
> Michal Březina — Short program: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEp7CMT1T-A>  
> Daniel Samohin — Short program: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgXcwCHtpZ8>  
> Misha Ge — Short program: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rwg0Zvo__U4>  
> Michal Březina — Free skate: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-51iIKIX5Q>  
> Daniel Samohin — Free skate: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8mxQVFiDRw>  
> Misha Ge — Free skate: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKsR1c5yRV8>
> 
> Similarly, any scores mentioned for Michal, Daniel, and Misha were their real scores. For Yuri, JJ, and Emil's scores, I made them up, taking into account both the real scores of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place medalists at Skate Canada 2016 and the characters' performances in the Rostelecom Cup.
> 
> One might notice that Yuri’s free skate only has four jumps in the second half, rather than the six he performs both in Episode 9 and 12; in Episode 9 he chooses to move two from the first half to the second in order to better compete with Yuuri and JJ.
> 
> There exists various meta speculating what year YOI is set in; I chose 2016 to pluck skaters from Skate Canada because that was the year that YOI aired.
> 
> I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


	5. pirozhkis

Yuri tried to focus on entering his jumps with arms raised. He already had height, distance, and effortlessness down for his GOE scores; a difficult entry meant that he might be able to wrack up all three additional points to the base value. 

And since he _could_ , it meant that it would be his fault if he didn't and lost.

He started waking up before Lilia, practicing in the studio until she sat him down for breakfast, then heading straight to the rink. He'd generally be too tired at lunch to make it to the cafeteria, so he'd hide in the locker room instead, try to catch a quick nap on one of the benches. Then afternoon practice with either Yakov or Lilia, or strength training in the gym, and then working on choreography and ballet with Mila. Yakov was focused on working with Georgi in preparation for Cup of China, so Mila spent a lot of time on and off the rink with Yuri.

That was, when she wasn't trying to seduce Cute Brunette Woman who taught the little kids at the Saturday morning classes. Although Brunette was painfully oblivious, Yuri didn't know the last time Mila had willingly woken up on a Saturday morning. Wasn’t like that was the only time she could see Cute Brunette, considering that Cute Brunette worked at the rink part-time and could be found on odd shifts in the cafeteria or cleaning the ice. But apparently Mila had wanted to impress Cute Brunette with some jumps and spins early Saturday morning, which, _Cute Brunette worked there, she saw skaters jumping and spinning all the time_ , but the kids loved it, and Cute Brunette loved children, so Mila kept doing it. Even asked Yuri to show up once because apparently he was several of the kids’ favorite skater. 

(Yuri went, okay, and skated _Agape_ for them, and it was kind of flattering how the kids gasped and burst into applause every time he did a jump or a spin, and the unadulterated admiration in their eyes afterwards. “You owe me,” he told Mila, but he never came to collect.)

Cup of China came before Yuri knew it, which meant that Yakov and Georgi were gone, and Lilia took over supervising Yuri’s time at the rink. Yuri had been talking with Georgi less and less since he came back from Skate Canada; he’d only really talked to Georgi in the first place because Mila was always all over Georgi’s business, not that he could understand why. Georgi was pathetic. Georgi would hate him before the season was out, because he and Georgi were competitors, and he was going to win the Grand Prix series. Georgi had lived his whole life in Victor’s shadow—even born one day after Victor, always a step behind, always a step _worse_. He wouldn’t have long before he had to retire, and he wasn’t going to have the chance to win gold.

Yuri would never be like that. He would rather _die_ than be like that.

Time differences meant that the skaters in Group 1 were competing right about at lunchtime, and the cafeteria had a television, so he made his way there to watch. Georgi was in Group 2, but Yuri had checked, Katsuki was the last skater of Group 1, which meant that Yuri could slink into the cafeteria late and look like he was just there early for Georgi.

Mila and Cute Brunette were already sitting at a table, so Yuri picked a spot well behind them and took out a juice box. It was more vegetables than fruit, Lilia got them so of course they were disgustingly healthy, but they worked well for a sugar boost so that he wouldn't fall asleep. 

"Yuri, it's about to start, come watch with us!" Mila said.

No way in hell was Yuri interested in third wheeling, he was just here because the screen was nice. 

"I'm fine, I'll watch from over here," he said. If Mila would just ask the girl out, then he wouldn't have to deal with all the fucking pining. 

"Katsuki Yuuri from Japan is skating his first program of the Grand Prix series. The music is 'On Love: Eros.' He’s declared this year’s theme to be love."

Yuri tried not to look interested.

"Well, he’s certainly changed drastically from previous seasons," cut in a second announcer. "Maybe living with his coach, Victor, has changed things for him mentally."

Five years. Katsuki had been skating for five years without a soul, and now he had his back. Of course his skating was going to be different. Not than _anyone knew._

Except Yuri. (And Victor, and Katsuki's old coach, and his roommate, and his family.)

Yuri wondered whether or not his skating would be different if he still had a soul. Not that he was really ever planning on asking for his back. 

"Katsuki has told us he’d like to pursue eros in his short program," the first announcer said.

"What an amazing step sequence! That was wonderful!" the second announcer said.

Yuri chewed on his plastic straw. It was weird watching Katsuki skate without seeing the remnants of his deal hanging over his head. “Katsuki Yuuri has planned all his jumps for the second half of the program to get higher scores so he can win the Grand Prix Final.” Katsuki went into his combination spin, good, spins were one of his strengths.“The first planned jump is a triple axel. Here we go, a spread eagle into…a triple axel. Nice height!” He was good at triple axels, that was always a safe jump. Yuri released a breath that he didn’t know he was holding. “Okay, up next is a quadruple Salchow. In competition, he’s landed it less than 30% of the time. A quadruple Salchow. He nailed it!”

This time he couldn’t help it, he jumped out of his seat, fist clenched in the air. “YES!”

Mila and Brunette immediately turned to stare at him.

“Victor was being a useless asshole so I taught him how to land that one,” Yuri said. “Stop looking at me like that.”

“You taught him how to land a quad?” Mila asked.

Yuri huffed and stared resolutely at the screen instead.

“Quadruple toe loop, followed by a triple toe loop. He did it! So far, all the jumps have been flawless! He’s about to complete a short program with the highest technical difficulty in history! You’re witnessing the birth of a new Katsuki Yuuri!"

The camera cut to the side of the rink, where Victor was going out of his mind cheering. 

"Love wins!" 

(Yuri wanted to destroy something.)

"No one can deny that this was a perfect performance! It’s a personal best for Katsuki Yuuri. The audience is still on their feet! He used last season’s disappointment as a springboard to learn what love is, and he’s undergone an astounding transformation!"

Katsuki and Victor sat together at the Kiss and Cry, waiting for the score, and Yuri still wanted to either puke or punch something.

"Well, his coach, Victor, looks very happy!"

"I'm bored, tell me when Georgi is up," Yuri said and he shoved his earbuds in, blasted whatever music was cued up on his phone, and stared at the black screen of it like he was on Instagram or something.

Except, oh shit, he'd miss the score if—

"And we have his short program score: 106.84! A new personal best"

Victor was clapping, and the pig leaned forward and squinted like he couldn't quite read the numbers in front of him, which he probably couldn't, because he refused to skate with contacts.

"He’s currently in first place!"

Yuri put his earbuds back in and turned to his phone again. He glanced up thirty seconds later, and Katsuki was giving an interview; he couldn't hear what was being said, but Katsuki looked terrified and like he was about to be sick, which was ridiculous, he'd scored over 100 in his short program and was probably going to be in the lead going into the free skate. 

Yuri was getting really, _really_ frustrated that he wasn't there because if he could just—if he could see Katsuki in person, he'd be able to _see_ so much more and maybe he could figure out what was going on, but no, he was stuck just watching Katsuki look really nervous and unhappy with his incredible performance on television.

Georgi, in his ridiculous black, purple, and blue costume, with the truly horrifying eyeshadow, was the next skater. Yuri stared resolutely at his phone.

"Hey, Georgi’s is about to start!" Mila said.

"Whatever." Except he turned his music off and did turn back a bit towards the screen, because if he wasn't here to watch Georgi, what was he doing at all.

"Georgi Popovic, age 27, from Russia. This season’s theme is heartbreak. The music is 'Carabosse' from _The Sleeping Beauty._ " 

The first jump was a triple axel, they couldn't even get to it without Mila doubling over laughing. "This still cracks me up every time," she said.

Cute Brunette looked confused, which meant that Mila hadn't caught her up on the rink gossip, not that Yuri understood how anyone who had even set foot in the general vicinity of the rink could have missed Georgi's breakup with Anya.

"He broke up with the ice dancer he always used to post kissy photos with," she explained. "Oh, she hooked up with a different guy recently. Did you know about that, Yuri?"

Yuri, in fact, did _not_ know about that, and also didn't need it rubbed in his face that he didn't. "Shut up, Baba!" he snapped.

"A quadruple Salchow. What an emotional performance," the announcer continued to narrate from the screen. Yuri glared back at his phone again. 

"Yikes, he’s actually crying," Mila said.

Yuri looked up. "Seriously?"

"A triple Lutz, triple loop combination."

"I can almost hear her terrified voice," Mila said.

"He’s way too into this performance," Yuri said.

"His step sequence is intense." 

_Yeah, Mr. Announcer, intense is one word for it,_ Yuri thought. Although Georgi did look a bit more worked up than usual. The program ended with no huge technical mistakes, though.

“Georgi Popovich’s short program score is 98.17. He is currently in second place.” Georgi did a stupid little dance with finger guns on the screen from the Kiss and Cry, and Yuri rolled his eyes.

“Oh, right, his ex is also competing in the Cup of China,” Mila said nonchalantly, as if she hadn’t known from the start.

Georgi made finger hearts towards the camera.

“Seriously? That’s gotta suck,” Yuri said. Poor Georgi. The poor girl. Poor anyone who fell for love bullshit.

Some American named Leo was up performing next, but really, Yuri had seen all that he’d come to see. He hopped off the table. “Have fun, I’m going back to practice.”

___________________________________________

Yuri watched all of Katsuki’s interviews on the internet that night. A single segment stuck with him: the reporter asking, “Katsuki, your thoughts on the upcoming free skate?”, Katsuki replying, “W-with my coach, Victor, I’ll win with the power of love!”, and Victor videobombing the scene with his stupid movie-star smile chanting “Win, win!”

It was stupid, but Yuri felt so _mad_ at Victor. Katsuki was his new shiny thing, but eventually Victor would lose interest, and he didn’t—he didn’t want Katsuki to have to live through that, he couldn’t—

 _Victor was in love_ , he reminded himself. Victor wouldn’t leave the pig. He shouldn’t even care in the first place.

Except…

when had love ever been enough?

___________________________________________

Yuri almost missed the free skate the next day. 

He’d completely forgotten that Georgi was going to be competing, and he wasn’t sure that he wanted to see Katsuki at all, not with how…not with how upset he was at Victor. But he checked the time when he was taking off his skates to head over to the cafeteria to actually eat for once, realized that he could probably make it in time to catch both Georgi and Katsuki, and brought his borscht and plastic spoon to his usual spot three tables behind Mila and Cute Brunette. Yuri flipped through his phone, trying to figure out what he missed. Katsuki had flubbed a jump in practice, and looked stupidly down, some news article reported. 

Maybe if Katsuki lost badly enough, Victor would come home.

Georgi was finishing up at the Kiss and Cry, and his score was announced as 252.44. That put him in third, which, unless Katsuki completely bombed the free skate, meant that Georgi wouldn't even make the podium. Yuri tried to feel bad for him, but instead he felt nothing. Georgi had years to make his own name in figure skating, it wasn't Yuri's fault that he'd never been enough.

It was Katsuki's turn. Yuri could swear that the pig's eyes were red; had he been crying before this? Yuri cursed under his breath again that he wasn't _there_ , he wanted to be able to _see_ , even just the little contextual clues of whether or not the cloud above Katsuki's head was darker than usual would give him some idea of what was going on, but instead he had to sit here, completely helpless, not able to _do_ anything.

The music started, and the program started. It was pretty good, especially considering that Katsuki had never choreographed anything before. And Yuri knew that Victor hadn't cheated it and done the backbone of the work, because he knew what Victor's choreography looked like, and this wasn't a Nikiforov program. This was all Katsuki Yuuri.

Katsuki made the quad toe loop, double toe loop combination, then the quad Salchow.

"You're not going to cheer?" Mila asked.

"I will hold you down and skate over your throat," Yuri said.

Mila just laughed.

Katsuki got through the triple loop, but touched down on the triple axel, and Yuri wanted to _scream_. He hadn't expected that touch-down. Katsuki was usually good at triple axels. What the fuck had happened? God, it was so stressful to watch someone skating who couldn't make all his jumps.

Triple axel, single loop, triple Salchow combination—and the idiot overrotated, oh god, it was like watching a train wreck in action. Triple Lutz, triple toe loop combination, that went alright. Then he was onto the step sequence, and wow, Katsuki was good at step sequences. He looked almost.... relaxed, beneath it all. Serene.

The final jump was supposed to be a quadruple toe loop, except, Katsuki was leaning like he was going to use the inside, not the outside edge, and—

 _Don't you dare,_ Yuri thought.

Katsuki did a quadruple flip. 

He _fell_ , but he did a fucking quad flip. Got enough rotations in. He _finished his program_ on a quad flip.

Yuri was still gaping as Katsuki went into his final spin, he'd _finished his program_ on— 

"Not even Nikiforov ever did a jump this difficult at the end of a program, when fatigue would be at its peak! Here’s a man who’ll go above and beyond our expectations, Katsuki Yuuri!"

Victor went running to the side of the rink, and Katsuki skated towards him, and then Victor was jumping into the pig's arms and _kissing_ him.

(Which, at least solved one mystery of where those two idiots were with their relationship.)

Yuri was...hyperventilating. He couldn't— 

He couldn't believe that Katsuki was stupid enough to try a quad flip at the end of his program, when he could have easily landed wrong and broken his ankle just in exhaustion. He couldn't believe that Victor had tackle-kissed the pig, _while they were on the ice_ , Katsuki could have—should have—gotten a fucking concussion for a stunt like that, and it was a miracle neither of them had been cut by his skates, but did either of them _think_? No. No one gave anything a moment's thought, did they live in a world where consequences didn't exist? 

When Yuri looked back at the screen, they were on the interview portion, and he didn't know how they got there, he must have blacked out because he didn't remember the Kiss and Cry or Katsuki's score. There was just Victor's stupid face saying "Now that Yuuri can do a quadruple flip, he’ll definitely win at the Rostelecom Cup and advance to the Grand Prix Final. I’m looking forward to going to Russia as his coach."

Yuri snapped his plastic spoon.

Mila turned around, was looking at him, was saying something, but he couldn't tell _what_. He just couldn’t—

He slammed his fist down on the table, and ran out of the room.

___________________________________________

Yuri was in a bad mood the next morning, and it didn't help when Mila came in with a black cloud hanging over her.

“You went out drinking again last night,” Yuri accused.

Mila just laughed. “You can always tell.”

“Because you always skip your hangovers the supernatural way. The demon deal hangs over you more than the stench of alcohol could,” Yuri spit.

“Oh, right, I forgot you were psychic,” she said, patting his head.

“Fuck you! You could have taken me with! Hag!”

She laughed again. “And risk Lilia killing me for letting you break your diet? You would get blooooa~ ted !”

Fuck. His diet. He had been…mostly forgetting to eat, at this point, when people weren’t putting things in front of him. Which meant if he got back after Lilia had finished dinner or Yakov was out late or his rinkmates didn’t invite him to lunch—

“Yuri, are you alright?”

His eyes snapped back to her. “I’m fine, _Baba_.”

She looked thoughtful. “Girls aren’t the only people who suffer from body image problems, or eating disorders.”

“I said I’m fine!”

“You know, when I was younger—“

“I don’t need to hear about your stupid tragic backstory!”

The moment the words were out of Yuri’s mouth, he regretted them. But the smug look on Mila’s face told him that she knew that too, so he pushed down the feeling and skated off.

(She dragged him out to lunch that day. He tried to at least put in the effort to look affronted. But she did it the next day, and the next day too, and Yuri let himself feel, just a little bit, that the tide of water that kept threatening to overwhelm him could abate, at least long enough for him to breathe.)

___________________________________________

Georgi got bronze in Trophee de France, which meant that he wouldn't be progressing to the Grand Prix Final. Which meant that Yuri was Yakov's only hope to prove that he remained relevant as a coach even after Victor dropped him.

(Well, the only hope in men's singles. Mila had gotten silver in Skate America and was competing at Rostelecom Cup too, and was almost certainly guaranteed at least a silver there considering her competitors, and besides that Yakov had been an established coach well before Victor had come along and really nobody _needed_ Yuri—

But the pressure was still there. He still felt it. He still had to win.)

___________________________________________

Taking the plane to Moscow was always stressful, mostly because his awful fan club always managed to figure out when he was planning on traveling and would be waiting for him at the terminal exit. But also, it was stressful because his grandfather didn't know how to use a cell phone and always said that he'd be waiting for him and Yuri never knew when he asked Yakov or Mila to watch his bags and slipped out the back whether or not this would be the time that his grandfather didn't make it.

But he saw Dedushka's ugly teal car idling by the curb, heard the familiar shout of, "Yuri!", all his doubts melted in the wind. He couldn't stand the distance any longer, sprinted over to where his grandfather was standing, and leapt into his arms.

There was an ominous-sounding crack, and his grandfather dropped him to the ground.

(Yuri landed on his feet, of course.)

"S-sorry, I forgot you had a bad back," Yuri stammered. Dedushka stood up, waved him off, but the guilt still curled in Yuri's stomach.

They drove in comfortable silence until they were out of the airport traffic, then Dedushka motioned to a paper bag between the seats. "Yuri, I made my usual pirozhkis for you."

Yuri wasted no time biting into one, and it was _heaven_ , it was the first time he remembered tasting food in _months_.

"Grandpa, have you ever had a pork cutlet bowl?" he asked.

“Pork cutlet bowl?” Dedushka said. 

“I had them back in Japan!” Yuri said. “They’re really tasty.”

Dedushka was silent for a moment, then asked, “Are the pirozhkis not very good?”

“No, that’s not what I meant!” Yuri said, and oh god, oh god, Dedushka was going to hate him now, he—

The old radio finished whatever old-person song it had been playing in the background, and suddenly, the host was speaking in his old, crackly voice. “Our national hero, Victor Nikiforov, has returned to Russia as a coach in the Figure Skating Grand Prix Series.” Yuri froze, and then before any more could be said, slammed the volume nob down so the damn thing turned off and he wouldn’t have to hear any more of it.

"Victor, he was your first friend at the rink, wasn't he?" Dedushka said. 

"I guess," Yuri said. "I have other friends now."

"The woman skater who lifts you above her head?" he asked. He was definitely teasing now. He knew Mila’s name, he’d talked to her on the phone before.

"Yeah," Yuri said. "We're practicing ballet now."

"You were always so good at ballet," Dedushka said.

"I'm being trained by Lilia Baranovskaya!" Yuri said. "She's the best in the world!"

Dedushka smiled.

(Yuri had, of course, already told Dedushka about Lilia; Dedushka called every weekend, and Yuri filled him in on things, but it was nice to say it here, out loud, where Yuri could see Dedushka's face fill with pride.) 

"You'll come and see me tomorrow, right?" Yuri said. _Agape is for you, I've always skated for you._

"Of course," Dedushka said. 

They lived—well, just Dedushka now, lived on the outskirts of town, Yuri’s old room collecting dust as it only saw the light of day the handful of days that Yuri was ever able to make it up to Moscow to visit, but Dedushka wasn’t driving the familiar route towards home, which meant that he just planned to drop Yuri off at the hotel.

Which was okay. Yuri could use the rest. The competition started tomorrow, it wasn’t like they had a lot of time to spare. Still, it—it felt like every second he had with his grandfather was going to be his last. Which was—was stupid, nothing could happen to his grandfather while the deal was in place, and he wasn’t going to end it, _ever_ , just—

He couldn’t regret skating. It was what had paid their bills. And he _liked_ the ice, and he _liked_ winning, and he knew Dedushka was proud of him.

It just wasn’t a long enough drive to the hotel, that was all.

___________________________________________

Apparently Victor and the pig had arrived at the hotel by the time Yuri got there, because there was a huge crowd of reporters surrounding the silver-haired geezer. Wearing sunglasses and clutching a coffee and everything, holding court. Yuri caught the tail end of a question—“When will you return to skating?”—and Victor’s answer “Until the Grand Prix Final is over, I won’t comment on any future plans. Right now, I see a lot of potential in Katsuki Yuuri’s skating. I’d like you all to focus on Yuuri at the Rostelecom Cup.”

Which, yeah, the press was being kind of shitty focusing on Victor. Katsuki probably had to deal with this bullshit all season, and Yuri _knew_ how much it sucked, but also, it hurt a bit to have been forgotten by Victor so quickly. Yuri was competing too, wasn't he?

“If the skater Yuuri has that much charisma, don’t you want to face him as a fellow competitor?” another reporter cut in, and oh, that was interesting, Victor had…weirdly complicated feelings there. Regret, mixed with something else intensely strong, enough to dim him. 

Yuri shook his head quickly, their relationship thoroughly _wasn’t_ his business and he literally could not conceive something he wanted less than knowing exactly how and when Victor’s love life was breaking down simply by being able to read Victor better than most people could, and with an ability that no one else had. 

“Hey, it’s Yurio!” Victor shouted, and Yuri took it all back, his love life could crash and burn, he _hated_ reporters and Victor _knew_ that but Yuri made a great distraction, didn’t he, so Victor didn’t give a fuck about throwing him under the bus as the reporters swarmed him instead. Victor, of course, hopped into the middle of it all, pulled Yuri to his side, and smiled blindingly. “Did you all see the short program I put together for Yurio?”

It was just—too much, too close, Victor hugging him like they were still best friends when he'd been tossed aside, Yuri felt dizzy and it was like he was seeing red, he wasn't even in control of his body, suddenly he'd slapped Victor's coffee out of his hands and was hissing at Victor, "Quit acting like you’re still the top Russian figure skater. I’m the star in this event!"

Victor looked _hurt_ , and Yuri didn't know what to do, how to fix it. So he shoved Victor's arm off him and ran towards the elevators. There were a whole bunch of skaters arguing outside of one, and the other looked empty and was just closing so Yuri stuck his foot into the door to catch that one, thank you very much, only to find that Katsuki was standing inside.

“Why are you sneaking around?” Yuri said.

Katsuki just smiled at him. Genuinely smiled. _I-can-see-you-partially-lighting-up_ smiled. It was disgusting. “Yurio…good to see you again.”

Yuri hit the button for the eighth floor; Katsuki already had the ninth pressed. The silence stretched awkwardly. 

"Um, good luck to both of us in the Rostelecom Cup," the pig said.

"Huh? You’ll suffer a miserable defeat here in Moscow," Yuri snapped. "Then Victor will stay in Russia."

Which, oh god, he hadn't meant to say that. He didn't even _care_ about Victor staying, not anymore, not when it was painfully clear Victor didn't want to be here, but it had come out and now he couldn't take it back. And it was probably Katsuki’s greatest fear, too, he _knew_ how self-conscious the pig was, how much he doubted himself.

Yuri was saved by the ding of the elevator, and got the fuck out of there, Katsuki watching him curiously the whole time.

___________________________________________

The next day was the short program, Yuri and Katsuki (and, annoyingly enough, the stupid Canadian who had beaten him) were all in the final group. Yuri didn’t bother going out and watching the earlier performances. He could study his competitors before the Grand Prix, right now, the only thing that mattered was his own performance. 

Dedushka would be watching him. Dedushka—had been supposed to meet him at the rink before, though, and he hadn’t shown up. Lilia ran him through all his stretches, but he was distracted, even though his body moved like it should. Yakov had eventually chased him into the back room and stated that he would find out what was happening, but Yuri needed to go through his warmups and calm down. So he put his earbuds in and put _Agape_ on repeat and tried to find his inner peace or whatever that bullshit was.

Eventually, he got tired of listening to it, so he turned it off, just watched as one by one skaters trickled out to the rink. The cheers of the audience sounded like roars of some mythological beast above them, it made for very interesting ambient noise. Yuri slipped into a weird, pseudo-meditative state. He wondered if his grandfather was there yet. He wondered if his grandfather was going to bother to show up at all.

At this point, it was Yuri, JJ, and Katsuki warming up in the back room, and Victor, of course, leaning against a wall watching the pig. JJ alone seemed to be paying attention to the monitor that was streaming the proceedings out on the rink. Except he was also eyeing Victor and Katsuki in a way that Yuri did not like, and if JJ broke the unspoken code of _leave us to fuck alone_ , Yuri would—

He wasn’t sure what he would do.

JJ turned and walked towards Victor and Katsuki, breaking the unspoken code of _leave us to fuck alone_.

“Did you hear that? Emil landed a quadruple loop, too. The applause!”

Katsuki looked up, and took his earbuds out. “Huh? Sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

JJ walked past Katsuki towards Victor, ignoring the pig completely. “Victor did the same jump at last year’s exhibition. I want to see that again.”

Victor, for his part, looked thoroughly put out. “I don’t recall.”

Katsuki didn’t look as upset about JJ’s pronouncement and its implications as Yuri expected him to, considering how many other skaters must have condemned him for stealing Victor from skating. Maybe he’d gotten over that at Cup of China or something, but the pair of them still looked really uncomfortable with how forward JJ was acting.

“Oi, Leroy!” Yuri said, and all three turned to him. “Watch a fucking video on Youtube if you want to see Victor jump again. There’s a new generation of skaters now.”

“Oh, really?” JJ said with a cocky smile.

“Yeah,” Yuri said. “You won’t be wishing for Victor’s return when your best can only get you bronze on the podium.”

“Bronze?” JJ repeated.

Yuri rolled his eyes and turned to Katsuki because everyone else in the room was an idiot. “You better get silver,” he said. “Or that’s the last time I stick my neck out for you and the old geezer.” Then he stormed dramatically from the room.

He made his way to the rink, because he was actually going to be skating soon, and Lilia and Yakov found him in the hallway and fell in step with him. “Has he gotten here yet?” Yuri whispered to Yakov.

“He won’t be making it,” Yakov said. “He hurt his back.” Yakov and Lilia shared a look. “It’s not serious, he just thought it would be better if he stayed in bed today.”

Yuri _knew_ they were worried that he would worry, _knew_ that they were scared that this would throw him off, and he almost wanted to laugh at the irony of it. His grandfather would be fine, the demon would make sure of that— _old people are frail_ , it had told him, before promising that his grandfather would be alive and well for as long as it held his soul.

It was that he hadn’t been feeling anything close to _agape_ in ages, and he was hoping that having his grandfather here—knowing his grandfather was watching—could…could give him that magical extra push that he needed to up his PC scores. Agape was getting further and further from his reach, and Dedushka was supposed to be unconditional love for him.

Then it was Katsuki’s turn. Yuri knew because the crowd was chanting for _Victor_ , and he wanted to punch something, wanted to destroy something, how _dare_ Victor take that from the pig.

“I want to see this,” he told Yakov and Lilia. “I want to watch Katsuki perform.”

The pair shared another look, but allowed him to lead the way to the rink.

Yuri missed the very first bit, it was about twenty seconds into the music by the time he made it to the edge of the ice, but he could immediately tell that this performance was different. There was no anxiety surrounding Katsuki, whatever it was that normally held him back had completely detached from him, and he was _dancing_ with it, it wove in front and behind him, caressing him, moving in perfect time with the music. When he came to his first jump, the triple axel from the spread eagle, it slipped behind him, hoisted him up as he launched into the jump, then winked out of existence and back into existence to offer him a hand as he landed perfectly. 

Katsuki was dancing with his own anxieties, and he looked _beautiful._

He was glowing, too, surrounded by the same sparklers of light that Yuri had glimpsed once before, Yuri could see them dim in concentration as Katsuki approached the quad Salchow then explode in brightness as he leaped into the air and Yuri _knew_ the landing was going to be clean before he made it, could see Victor glowing too with pride and something more from across the rink. But Yuri couldn’t take his eyes off of Katsuki, Lilia was trying to talk to him but all Yuri could watch was the choreographic sequence that for some incomprehensible reason looked even _better_ as a pair skate and was so—so ridiculous, so frustrating, that no one but him could see it. Katsuki went into the last spin, the combination spin, and the halo of his anxieties circled him again but whipped outward from the centrifugal force, spreading across the ice in a light-show. Then the music stopped and the crowd went wild.

It was an awe-inspiring performance. Almost definitely better than Cup of China, although Yuri might have been utterly biased by being able to properly _see_ Katsuki here. Katsuki was getting a standing ovation, but Yuri could also see as the man caught his breath—whatever energy he had expended at the end of his performance, it darkened, like an oil slick across the ice, and drew back towards him, coalesced around him as his posture changed back to the uncertainty that Yuri was painfully familiar with and he waved to the crowd. 

So that was what it was like, watching Katsuki skate to his full potential. 

Yuri shook his head slightly; he couldn’t be caught up in stupid thoughts. He had to think of his own performance. He had to figure out how the hell he was going to find _agape_ within himself in the next thirty seconds, knowing his grandfather hadn’t come to watch.

Lilia slipped his Team Russia jacket off of his shoulders, almost reverently. 

He was the prima ballerina. He was supposed to be able to do this. Why was it so hard?

He—he made his way to the edge of the rink, except he hadn’t thought it through, because Katsuki had to _exit_ the fucking rink, which meant that Katsuki skated over to exactly where he was standing and just—just _stared_ him down for ten seconds as Yuri tried to find his voice.

“Out of my way, pig,” he finally said, and stalked past.

His fans were screaming “Yuratchka” at him, he _hated_ it, hated it when anyone called him that except his grandfather, his grandfather who _was not there_ , and oh god he couldn’t think of anything else. Dedushka had never missed a single one of his practices, why wasn’t he here _now_ —

Lilia and Yakov were trying to give him advice, Yakov was saying, “Yuri, there’s no need to get tense just because it’s the Rostelecom Cup,” and Lilia was saying, “All the work you did in practice won’t betray you, listen, have confidence in yourself,” except they were both fading out until their mouths were moving and Yuri couldn’t hear _anything_ and oh god, what if he just fainted on the ice, then at least he wouldn’t have to skate the dumb program.

His eyes wandered over to the Kiss and Cry, and immediately Katsuki noticed him looking and waved back. 

“Oh, Yurio! Davai!”

Which, of course, made Victor notice.

“Yurio, good luck!”

And for some reason, the two of them—it was enough to snap him out of whatever had come over him. He wasn’t so down on his luck that he needed the two of them cheering him on.

He skated away, came to a graceful halt at the center of the rink, struck his position—arms down, looking down, the perfect picture of childhood innocence, and waited for the music to start.

Start it did, and he allowed muscle memory to take over, going from one fluid motion to another except he wasn’t _feeling_ agape at all, he was angry, just angry, he could feel it growing in the pit of his stomach and—

he leapt into the triple axel, except landing, his ankle rolled and he went tumbling to the ice, there was no sharp pain, nothing _broken_ , he’d tumbled cleanly, he was up before he could consciously think it, but he’d—he hadn’t missed a triple axel in over a year, and now this was suddenly happening to him?

The flying sit spin was next, he threw himself into it, combination spins were a strong point for him. He couldn’t—couldn’t let the program slip away from him. He had been pouring blood, sweat, and tears into it since his humiliation at Hasetsu, he wouldn’t let that repeat.

What would Lilia say?

She’d told him a few stories about her time at the Bolshoi Ballet. How cutthroat it had been, especially when she first got there. The petty backstabbing, the rumors, the rapidly shifting alliances between dancers. How time and time again they would be forced to dance with people they _hated_ , how none of that could show on the stage. That allowing emotions to spill from you, flood across the stage, and captivate the audience was the sign of a good dancer. That to be able to put on a mask, and lie about it all—that was the sign of a _great_ dancer. 

Fuck Victor and his waterfalls. Yuri could dance this on talent alone.

The choreographic sequence—he tried to project grace, humility, let it seep through the easy flow of the motions, despite his pounding heart and burning lungs. Quad Salchow, triple toe loop—he could hear the audience screaming for him, he got fantastic height on that one, and good flow, maybe the GOE points would make up for the deduction from his earlier fall. Another step sequence— _humble, graceful, innocent_ —he let his motions lead him, he had no idea if this mask was holding but at least it wasn’t the overconfidence and greed Victor had so eagerly chided him on.

He made the quad toe loop, it shouldn’t have even been a question, but today it had been a question. That was fine, all he had to do now was get through the final choreography. 

His motions were so intensely effortless, thank god for the hours upon hours of practice, both in the rink and at the studio, also thank god he had thought to grow his hair out, he knew that it added to the image, how it covered his face every time he bowed his head down. The music was reaching its closing segment, and he propelled himself into the last combination spin, drew his body in tightly so that he could whip around faster, reaching up then folding down then rising once more into the air. 

It was over. The crowd was cheering pretty hard, so he must have done okay. Someone threw down a pair of cat ears and they landed perfectly on his head, and yup, that was definitely a demon deal that one of his idiot fans had made because that wasn’t how the laws of physics worked, but whatever, he just wanted to get out of there. He skated over to the edge of the rink, and JJ was there, clapping condescendingly. 

“Oh, ladies first,” the Canadian said, bowing slightly and moving aside.

Yuri had forgotten that there was someone more annoying that Victor and the pig. He was going to destroy JJ, he had to, here and then at the Grand Prix Final.

He made his way to the Kiss and Cry, flanked by Yakov and Lilia, sat between them as they all waited for his score. 98.09, that put him in second. It didn't break 100, but it also wasn't terrible, he could come back from that. As long as he delivered a performance of _Allegro Appassionato_ as good as the one he gave at Skate Canada, he'd make it to the Grand Prix Final. That was what mattered.

Yuri did actually want to catch some of JJ’s performance; if JJ was going to be one of his main competitors he should at least know what he was up against. He could tell two things off the bat, the costume was an _absolutely disgusting_ shade of lavender with purple glitter highlights, and the song? That JJ had specially composed for him? Started off with “Now I rule the world, And the starry sky”, and if that didn’t tell Yuri all he needed to know about JJ, he didn’t know what would.

JJ started with a quad toe loop, triple toe loop combo, and then his fucking triple axel was high enough to nearly clear the fence, which wasn’t fair, who the fuck could jump that high? Followed by a step sequence that even Yuri would grudgingly admit was impressive, and then a quad Lutz in the _second half_ of the program.

That must have been the jump that he’d missed in Skate Canada, that had placed him below Yuri in the short program and given Yuri the misplaced confidence going into the free skate that he was going to snag gold easily. But here JJ made it easy, and he had a free skate with four quads coming up that was only going to up his scores to ridiculous heights. The crowd starting singing along to the dumb chorus of his dumb song and Yuri, for the umpteenth time that day, wanted to punch something. 

It ended, finally, and the fucker actually _kissed the ice_ , then stood up, grinned, and made the stupid sign with his hands that Yuri realized was supposed to be double J’s, and shouted, “It’s JJ Style!”

“Let’s go,” he told Yakov. He didn’t need to stay for the score, he already knew it was going to be well over 100. He could look it up in his hotel room, where there were plenty of pillows to scream into and punch and no one could see him do it or care.

“Don’t eat too many pirozhkis tomorrow, okay?” Yakov said.

“Yeah, yeah,” Yuri said. He’d already finished off his grandfather’s first bag of them instead of going out and getting dinner the night prior, and it wasn’t like he was going to get any more, considering he wasn’t sure if his grandfather was even going to make it. He didn’t need nagging, he just needed peace and quiet.

Except Katsuki and Victor were in the hallway in front of them, having an argument. 

Yuri couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he could _tell_ Victor was distraught and Katsuki was glowing with a fierce determination and it was almost too much, his eyes hurt, he didn’t want to have to see whatever stupid lover’s quarrel they were having now.

Then Victor caught sight of them, rushed forward, and practically threw himself into Yakov’s arms. “Yakov. Thank god! You’re the only coach for me.”

Yuri was actually going to murder Victor if the man decided _now_ that he wanted to come back, if he was going to abandon Katsuki after all this.

Yakov clearly was thinking down the same vein, because he smirked, said, “What? You want to come back?”

“Can you be Yuuri’s coach tomorrow, for just one day?” Victor begged.

There was a stunned silence as just about everyone who wasn’t Victor gaped, because what, why—Victor looked worn, tired, stressed, and _worried_ in a way that Yuri could see because Yuri knew his tells, Katsuki was clutching a phone in a fist trying to look strong but tension was coming off him in waves, Lilia was raising an eyebrow in the sort of way that she did before she ground someone to less than dust, and Yakov—Yakov was looking at _him_.

Of course. Because Yuri was his student, his skater. Because taking on an extra skater, a competitor no less, was going to affect Yuri the most.

Katsuki's fate was in his hands.

"Whatever, I don't care if you take him," Yuri said. "Not like I haven't trained with him before, he's quiet and he stays out of the way. We're making a scene."

"Thank you, _thank you_ ," Victor said, and he tackle-hugged Yuri, Yuri had to peel him off like an octopus. 

"Get—the fuck—off me," Yuri gritted out.

"Language!" Lilia immediately scolded. 

“Just, leave me alone,” Yuri told Victor. “All of you. I’m tired. I want to call Dedushka.” 

“Thank you,” Katsuki said, a lot quieter, but a lot more sincere. 

Yuri turned on heel and stormed away, and for the first time that day his luck held out, because no one followed him.

___________________________________________

He took a long shower that night, let the steam fill the hotel bathroom, let the hot water wash over him long after it should have gone cold. The mirror was fogged up by the time he finally stepped out. He traced a sigil through the condensation, one that he knew achingly well, one that he had drawn when he was only four.

There were no candles. There was no summoning incantation. The demon wouldn’t hear him. But it helped to speak anyway: “You _promised_ that my grandfather would be fine if you took his soul. And he’s not fine. His back is hurt. You got eleven years of my life. Eleven years! So fix it! Don’t let him be in fucking pain!”

Yuri’s voice petered out to just a murmur. 

“You promised.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


	6. katsudon

Georgi came to watch his free skate.

Well, not just his, Mila's too. He took an overnight train to Moscow and greeted Yuri with a hug at the hotel before they all headed over to morning practice.

Katsuki didn't talk to Yakov at all at practice, which was really fucking frustrating, because Yuri had gone out of his way to make sure that he had a coach even though Victor was gone and then he just...wasn't going to use Yakov at all? When Yakov probably would have been more useful than Victor? 

Yuri had half a mind to storm over there himself and demand that the pig show him a quad Salchow on the pretense that he wanted to make sure he could land them right since Hasetsu, and then maybe go through whatever other jumps were troubling him, because Yuri wasn't a coach but he could jump really well and he knew that Katsuki got anxious about landing his jumps, but he didn’t—didn’t know how to start the conversation. So he just watched Katsuki practice and get increasingly more upset, which in turn caused him to become increasingly more upset, and it just—it wasn’t a good morning. 

He wondered how much Victor would hate him if he got to the Grand Prix Final and Katsuki didn’t.

God, that was not a good thought to be heading to lunch on. 

Yuri had been planning on heading out with Georgi and Mila and maybe whatever other skaters Mila had befriended, except he waited for Katsuki in the locker room, and Katsuki proceeded to pretty much have a panic attack until he noticed that Yuri was still waiting for him, Yuri glared and said, "Lunch," and Katsuki took a deep breath, wiped his eyes, and nodded.

Yakov _and_ Lilia had both waited for _them_ , which meant lunch was an incredibly awkward affair in which Lilia took them out to whatever place had caught her fancy, she and Yakov desperately tried to pretend that whenever they went to fancy restaurants together it didn't remind them of whatever dates they had gone on or whatever back when they were together, and Yuri and Katsuki desperately tried to pretend that they weren’t…enemies? Rivals? Friends? That Katsuki hadn’t stolen Victor, except not really, that Yuri hadn’t come all the way to Japan to drag Victor back to Russia, except not really, that Katsuki didn’t act stupidly nice and Yuri didn’t act stupidly mean every time they interacted? 

Yeah, lunch was a pretty awkward affair.

They headed back to the stadium after that, to start the whole warm-up-and-change-and-interview process; the men’s free skate was earlier in the evening because the women were going after them. Yuri watched Katsuki out of the corner of his eye the whole time, Katsuki seemed stupidly nervous again the moment they got back, and it was making Yuri anxious again, and he _hated_ it. Finally, Yakov pulled him aside, and Yuri thought he was going to be yelled at for being all twitchy, except it wasn’t for that. It was to tell him that his grandfather was here.

Yuri hurried out back and sure enough, his grandfather was standing there, looking just fine, with a familiar brown bag in one hand.

“Grandpa, I thought you weren’t feeling well,” he said.

Dedushka waved him off. “Just try these.”

Even though he had just had lunch, he _always_ had room for his grandfather’s pirozhkis, and eating just one before a competition wouldn’t hurt. So he eagerly fished one out of the bag, and bit into it.

It was _incredible_ , except inside wasn’t…wasn’t beef, it was rice and egg and—

“It’s katsudon-pirozhki!” Dedushka said. “Eat them and do well in today’s free skate, Yuratchka.”

Yuri was ready to _cry_. “Okay,” he said, and he clutched the bag close to his heart. He could—he could do that.

___________________________________________

Lilia did his hair before competitions, at least, for the free skate, because that one involved intricate braiding and drawing the rest of his hair back into a ponytail. He felt himself relaxing as she fixed it into place, all her motions sharp and purposeful, even though she never _pulled_. 

Of all the things he had expected Lilia Baranovskaya to be, gentle was not one of them.

He'd placed third in the short program, so he'd be skating fourth in the lineup. He didn't bother watching the others before him, he didn't need to. There were two skaters he was competing with today: JJ and Katsuki. JJ he wanted to beat out of spite. Katsuki...Katsuki he just had to beat.

He knew how to do it, too. He didn't bother mentioning it to either Yakov or Lilia until they were walking towards the rink, though, far too late for them to do anything about it. The conversation was as simple as,

"Hey Yakov."

"Yeah?"

"I’m changing the jump composition."

"Hm?"

"I’ll reduce the number of jumps in the first half from four to two."

"So you’ll have six in the second half?"

"Yeah."

"Do you have a death wish?"

_Yeah._

"I can’t win against JJ or Yuuri otherwise."

And then he was on the rink.

The music started and it got under his skin and grated on his nerves and he fought it like a flame, let his limbs fly from one position to another with all the grace and rage that he'd dug from the depths of his bones, day in and day out at four in the morning, well before anyone else in the house was stirring, because sleep was no longer enough oblivion for him.

Dance with beauty, Lilia had told him. Beauty is the crushing force of righteousness. Strength means nothing without beauty.

It wasn't until the triple axel from the spiral that he realized _oh shit, that was high_ , and then _oh shit, I am not going to have the energy to physically make it through this program._

There was a step sequence next, the hellishly fast one, and Yuri could feel the burn of fatigue in his calves and his arms. He pushed through it. The two places where his triple Lutz and triple flip would have gone, he added more steps, folded them seamlessly into what Lilia had already composed for him.

The music slowed down, and the second half of the piece began.

He pretended that he had caught his breath, waited for the first point he'd singled out in his head that he could squeeze a jump in, and then took off.

Triple Lutz, landed cleanly. One down, five more to go.

His lungs were burning, this was usually the place where he caught his breath, except he had to slip a jump in, had to get the triple flip in before the next quad (oh god, how was he going to land a quad like this), so he gritted his teeth and did it.

His whole body was starting to burn, so he pushed aside all of the thoughts of _oh no, this is bad_ , and leaned into it. Pain meant he didn't have to think about anything else, it was all-consuming, it was almost freeing. It grounded him in his body and let him float away at the same time.

Quadruple toe loop, landed perfectly. 

Next came the choreographic sequence, another moment to catch his breath, but—

But fuck that. He didn’t want to catch his breath. He didn’t _need_ to catch his breath. If he was going to go down, he’d go down screaming, on the ice, hands scraped and bloodied, until they took that from him too. His skates cut back and forth into the ice, quick and angry. The ice, the ice, all that there was was the ice. He didn’t want to lose like that again. Not to Katsuki, not to JJ, not to _anyone_ , he nearly _screamed_ as he threw himself into the quad Salchow, triple toe loop, and god he was jumping far higher than usual.

(That was good, right? That was good, that would factor into his GOE scores.)

Triple loop, double toe loop, he bit into the pain, couldn’t tell if there was blood in his mouth or just the coppery taste of exhaustion as he _couldn’t breathe_ , couldn’t swallow, couldn’t—

Last jump combination. A triple axel, single loop, and a triple Salchow. He landed it.

He had landed all his jumps.

_He had landed all his jumps._

It ended with a combination spin, that was fine, he was still dizzy but he did it, the music was coming to an end and he did it, he had performed a perfect program, he—

He fell on his hands and knees panting as the audience roared.

He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t see. There were black spots at the edge of his vision, he was going to pass out on the rink, here and now, except that wasn’t acceptable so he gritted his teeth and pushed himself back on his feet and—and—

Lilia was waiting for him at the edge of the rink to take him to the Kiss and Cry, but not Yakov, and he was confused for a second before he remembered that Yakov was standing in as Katsuki’s coach and that Katsuki was supposed to skate next. He let Lilia put his Team Russia jacket over his shoulders, and leaned heavily into her as they made their way to the Kiss and Cry, and then there was a chair to sit in so he sat in that.

He closed his eyes.

Lilia’s hand shook his shoulder, and he groaned and opened them. 

“You made your personal best,” she said. “You’re in first place right now, which means you’ve secured your ticket to the Grand Prix Final. Chin up, be proud.” She pursed her lips. “You skated with beauty.”

So—so that was it, apparently. That was what qualifying for the Grand Prix Final in senior division felt like. Like wanting to die.

(And sure, maybe he was being overdramatic about it. Except there was a small part of him that didn’t really feel like any of this had been joking, and that part scared him. A lot.)

“How’d you like my free skate, Katsudon!” he shouted over to where Katsuki was getting ready to get on the ice, except Katsuki didn’t turn, didn’t hear him, just looked small and lost on the ice.

"Katsuki Yuuri from Japan is in second place after the short program. He is skating to ‘Yuri on Ice.’"

Yuri could _see_ how heavily Katsuki’s doubts were weighing on him. And he knew, without doubt, that this was going to be a disaster. The music started, they were coming up to his first jump, the quad toe loop, double toe loop, and Katsuki’s fears gathered around him stronger, so much that they were almost opaque, and Yuri _knew_ before it happened that Katsuki was going to pop the second jump, a double turned into a single.

He could _see_ Katsuki trying to calm down, and only sort of succeeding. 

Absolute. Fucking. Disaster. 

He made the quad Salchow with enough rotations, barely, as Yuri gritted his teeth.

Through the camel spin and the next choreographic sequence, Yuri could see him lighting up a little bit, a glow trying to break through all the anxiety. Except it still hung around him, clinging to the bottom of his legs, weighing him down and dragging him back and—

The triple loop, he two-footed the landing.

“You idiot, hang in there!” Yuri screamed at him.

Somewhere to the side, JJ wolf-whistled, and said, “ _Yuri_ , all supportive now that you’ve clinched your spot in the Final?” then winked and “Cheer for me too, will you?”, and Yuri decided that he was going to murder him, surely JJ had warranted it by now through sheer levels of annoyance.

Lilia must have noticed because her voice came from behind him: “Yuri, let’s go.”

Yuri waited until they were out of earshot of JJ, never taking his eyes from the rink, before gritting out, “I’m _going_ to watch this performance in full.”

At least the next choreographic sequence looked beautiful, smooth, effortless. Whether or not Katsuki was having an internal crisis, _damn_ could that man skate to the music. It was only his technical elements, only his jumps, that suffered when he was like this.

He landed the triple axel just fine, and got pretty good height on it. None of the exhaustion that Yuri had felt was clinging to him, and wow, Yuri would kill for that kind of stamina. Katsuki pushed the black cloud off, pushed forward through sheer determination, and—

Yup, the triple flip went fine.

It wasn’t just Katsuki’s arms reaching towards the audience during the step sequences, Yuri realized. It was how he opened his whole body. It was the expression of perfect sereneness on his face. It was how he invited them to all feel an emotion that he was barely feeling himself, what with all the worries surrounding him, and god, something about that made Yuri want to cry.

Triple axel, single loop, and a triple Salchow. It almost looked like he had stumbled during the loop, but he’d landed everything, his determination was stronger than whatever was weighing him down. Triple Lutz, triple toe loop, also went just fine. The step sequence, this was where his love was shining through, quite literally, Yuri had to pretend that it didn’t grate on his nerves because—

Because why? Victor and Katsuki had this? It shouldn’t matter and Yuri had _wanted_ Katsuki not to flop so why the fuck did he feel so disgusted, disgusted with everyone and everything but mostly himself for—for—

for being left behind again.

Katsuki had traded out the quadruple flip at the end for a quad toe loop, double toe loop combo, and he _almost_ made it, touched down on the double but it had really nice flow up until the end, and then it was—then it was the combination spin, then it was over, with Katsuki looking up, one arm extended out towards someone who wasn’t even there.

Reaching towards Victor, because he knew that Victor was going to come back for him.

Yuri ran from the rink, ran as far as he could, ducked through hallways further and further from where anyone might see or hear him before he found a bathroom and locked himself in a stall and burst out crying, and oh, the irony was not lost on him.

It was just—

Victor had left. 

Victor had _left_.

And he had never been allowed to miss him. Never been allowed to—to skate like Katsuki just had, his heart open on the ice, strip it bare for anyone and everyone to see, Victor had _left_ and Yuri was supposed to take that standing up and shrug it off with a smile and pretend that he could do this when _he couldn’t do this_ , he couldn’t handle it, he couldn’t—

He couldn’t stay crying in the bathroom where anyone might walk in on him.

(A part of him wanted Katsuki to walk in on him because Katsuki would probably be unreasonably nice and he wanted someone to be unreasonably nice to him right now.)

God, today had been a stupid whirlwind of emotions that were way, _way_ too much for him to handle.

He had lasted eleven years without a soul. That was a long time. An unbelievably long time. And it was starting to feel like—starting to feel like he had reached the end of the line.

___________________________________________

Yuri got back to the rink as JJ was finishing up. He didn’t really bother watching the end; he knew that JJ won. That would put Katsuki in fourth, and totaling up points from the whole series, Katsuki and Michele were essentially tied, which meant that Katsuki was getting through to the Grand Prix Final because he’d won second at Cup of China, while Michele had only taken bronze in the NHK Trophy. 

Yuri had to stop himself from shivering on the stand, because that was close, _so_ close, to losing everything Katsuki had worked for so hard this season. 

He didn’t see the man at all as he changed, and then made his way over to where the Women’s Free Skate was supposed to happen. Mila had placed first in the short program, so she was going to be skating last. He zoned out during the other performances, and honestly, he mostly zoned out during Mila’s performance, but it had to be stellar, because everyone was clapping really hard at the end and she placed first.

His grandfather came to give him one last hug before heading off.

He realized that he’d forgotten where he put the bag of katsudon-pirozhki, that he’d wanted to show it to Katsuki, wanted to let the goddamn Japanese skater try them but he had lost them, he had _lost_ them, he had—

Yakov caught up to Yuri, Mila, and Lilia outside of the stadium, and pressed a brown paper bag into Yuri’s hands, he must have found it in the locker room or something, and Yuri scarfed one of the katsudon-pirozhki down just to make sure it was real. Then he glared as everyone stared at him, said, “I’m having these for dinner so you all can go out without me, just leave me alone,” and stormed off. Everyone could think that he was upset for losing to JJ, which meant he had the evening free to do something that he should have done a long time ago.

___________________________________________

Katsuki was standing outside of the hotel, just sort of watching the snow fall, which meant that he didn’t notice when Yuri slipped past to get inside. He needed to get one thing from his room specifically, something he had smuggled all the way to Moscow on the off-chance he’d be doing this, or rather, the _not_ off-chance that Victor and Katsuki were off doing something lovey-dovey and he couldn’t stand to think about it, but either way.

Katsuki was still standing in the snow when Yuri got back outside.

“Hey!”

Katsuki turned towards him, and he threw the brown paper bag at the man. Katsuki caught it, thank god.

“You can have it. It’s almost your birthday, right?”

Yuri could see the confusion in his eyes as he opened the bag.

"Pirozhki?"

“Just eat it!” he said.

“Huh? Right here?” Katsuki said.

Yuri resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “Eat!” Katsuki still looked pretty doubtful, but he took a bite. Yuri could tell at just the moment when he realized that—

“There’s rice in this…pork cutlet and egg, too. It’s katsudon!”

Yuri grinned. “That’s right, my grandpa made them himself! Great, aren’t they?”

“Yeah! They’re _vkusno_!” 

Yuri tried not to laugh at his pronunciation, he’d probably picked it up from Victor and Victor was in the habit of drawing out all of his vowels whenever he exclaimed anything. They passed the bag back and forth until all the pirozhki were gone, and then just kind of stood there in silence, until eventually Katsuki let out a little sigh and stepped back, turned towards the hotel.

“Oi! Pig! Where are you going?”

Yuri could see the fear in Katsuki’s aura, even from behind; what, did he think he was going to yell at him again like after the Grand Prix Final in Sochi?

“B-back to my room,” Katsuki said. “I wanted to stay out of everyone’s way.”

“I’m coming with,” Yuri said.

“I—I really—“

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, there is one more night before you’re off to Japan and then we won’t see each other for a month, we’re going to have a sleepover and braid each other’s hair and have stupid heart-to-hearts so we can tell Victor we bonded.”

Katsuki’s mouth fell open. “Wh-what?” 

Yuri could see the gears turning in Katsuki’s head, and he couldn’t deal with being turned down, not right now. “I need to talk to you,” he blurted out. “I am actually asking you, right now, please, let me have a goddamn sleepover with you and get rip-roaring drunk and have this goddamn conversation.”

“Okay,” Katsuki said. 

The elevator ride up to Katsuki’s floor was silent, as was the ordeal of Katsuki trying to get his keycard to open the door. The moment that they got inside, Yuri started rummaging through all of the drawers by the mini-fridge because goddamnit, what sort of hotel didn’t have shot glasses.

“You’re not…actually planning on getting drunk, are you?” Katsuki asked.

Yuri pulled a bottle of vodka, three quarters of the way full, out of his backpack and slammed it onto the counter. “You’ve got a problem with that?” he growled. 

“It’s just…you’re a minor?”

“There’s no drinking age in Russia,” Yuri said. “You need be 18 to _buy_ alcohol if the sellers are going to be assholes, you can drink it whenever.” 

“Where did you…get it, then?” Katsuki asked.

“I earned it, Mila asked me to come over and babysit Georgi because he was drunk and crying about Anya and she wanted to go out, so I pilfered it from them.” Katsuki was still looking at him with those big eyes, and Yuri crossed his arms. “This is not a conversation I want to have sober.”

Something dangerously close to understanding flashed across Katsuki’s face.

“You know what I want to talk about,” Yuri accused.

Katsuki put his hands up, as if _that_ could save him now.

“HOW did you find out?!? How long have you known! Did you—“ Yuri couldn’t _breathe_ , his whole life was crashing down around him.

“The same way you knew about me, I think?” Katsuki said. “You saw it around me, did you?”

“You can see them too?!??”

“After three or four years, I started noticing,” Katsuki said. “It was…subtle, and then suddenly it was there. And it never really wore off, even after…”

The realization that anyone could have seen hit Yuri like a freight train. 

“Yurio? Yuri? Can you hear me?”

Yuri was somehow on the ground, and Katsuki was sitting next to him, the damn pig.

“Breathe with me? In and out?”

“Not…helping,” Yuri gritted out.

“I don’t think there’s anyone who could have seen it on you,” Katsuki was saying. “It took me years before I noticed anything. And I haven’t heard of anyone else who can see them either. I don’t think anyone knows.”

“They _can’t_ know.”

“Yurio, I—“

_“If they know they’ll make me end it and if I end it my grandfather dies.”_

It came out in such a rush, and god, he couldn't breathe again. Katsuki was silent, at least. Good. He didn’t want any pity.

“Just tell me how you did it. I need to last another five years.” 

Katsuki paused, and Yuri almost thought he was going to say something stupid like ‘maybe I did it but you shouldn’t try, I’m an adult and you’re just a kid,’ but he just resettled himself instead. “I had Phichit to talk to. Eventually, I started seeing a therapist for my anxiety. I got medication that helped a little. It really…didn’t feel like things were that different. There were days when…everything felt gray and I…and I couldn’t talk to people. But I’d had those days as a child, you know? I think to a certain degree, having a…having a deal took the things inside of me, and it took away some of the buffer I’d had against them. But it was okay, because I was doing it for my family, and because I knew it was going to be over.”

He let out a breath.

“You know, it was getting my soul back that was a lot worse. It—it _hurt_ , everything was saturated and overwhelming and for some reason it made my anxiety a lot harder to deal with, it was like I had grown, but this part of me hadn’t, and it didn’t feel like it fit any longer, like it was easier when there was a hole in me.”

Yuri looked at Katsuki, really looked at him. Through the black fuzzy halo that had faded somewhat since the competition, looked for something deeper, and—

suddenly it was _blinding._

“It’s…it’s incredibly bright.”

“Oh, you can see it?” Katsuki asked. “I had—I had always wondered if it had been hurt by being away from me for so long, or—or tarnished from being—“

“It’s brighter than Victor’s,” Yuri said, wiping the tears away from his eyes. “It’s so—it didn’t get hurt, okay? It’s still strong.”

Katsuki smiled at him, and for some reason it was more beautiful than Victor’s movie-star smile. “Then I bet your soul is shining bright too.”

“Don’t get all sentimental on me,” Yuri snapped, almost involuntarily. Then he remembered his original quest for vodka, and stood up abruptly, and there were the shot glasses, in the highest cabinet. Of course. “You want any?”

“I don’t hold my alcohol very well,” Katsuki said. “So maybe…no?”

Yuri burst out laughing. “Yeah, okay, maybe you’re right.” He poured himself a shot, drank it, and poured himself another before sliding down to sit on the ground next to Katsuki again, bottle in one hand, shot in the other. 

“It was so different watching today,” Yuri said. “You…you were so good when you skated Eros, and you almost…at times you were almost doing it again, it was so stressful watching though, you know? I can tell when you’re going to flub your jumps because the cloud gets darker and heavier. But when you were skating to _On Love_ , you were dancing with it.”

“I was?”

“It almost looked like a pair skate,” Yuri said. “It was _beautiful,_ it made me so mad.”

“Your shadow grows when it’s mad,” Katsuki said. “You get maddest before you jump. It’s great, shadows scatter all over the ice and then you fly above them.” 

“But you see how ugly I am,” Yuri said. “How messed up, you know? How empty.” He drank the shot of vodka, and poured himself another.

“You’ve never been _empty_ ,” Katsuki said. “You…you carve out a space in the world, you say ‘I am here and don’t you dare forget me,’ it was…sometimes when the shadows get huge they grow too high and they crash back down like a tower with no support but they—they fight right back up again, it’s a—a constant battle to keep climbing, there’s nothing _empty_ about you.” 

That’s verging into the exact territory of _feelings_ that Yuri was not ready to poke at. “The shadows on the ice sounds fucking sick. Maybe I should design an exhibition skate with lighting like that.”

“You should,” Katsuki agreed. 

The idea of designing an exhibition skate—the idea of doing anything beyond just getting through this season, hell, just the Grand Prix—Yuri put the bottle of vodka down, and slumped. “It’s getting harder and harder to cope. I got…I got silver, I blew my personal best out of the water, and I don’t feel…I don’t feel _good._ I couldn’t…Dedushka was watching and I didn’t even feel anything standing there. I hate it. I hate myself for it.”

“In Japan there are laws now against deals that last more than thirty days,” Katsuki said. “After the recession when things got bad, a lot of people made deals, and suicide rates went way up. It was…I made my deal before I knew how _dangerous_ it was.”

“My mother made deals all the time,” Yuri said. “She had been…she had been an _pop star_ before I happened and then she said someone got jealous and wished for her misfortune but really I think she was just a mess after my father left. But she made them all the time for tiny things. Usually the rent, for a night with good tips, you know? Sometimes to get high and forget it all. Sometimes to try to get back…what she had lost. Before her career crashed and burned. My grandfather yelled at her one night for it. About the example she was setting. How it was no place to be raising a child. She was just trying to help, you know? But she was kind of a terrible mother. Eventually she just left too.” He grabbed the vodka again.

“I’m sorry,” Katsuki said.

“No pity,” Yuri growled. “This isn’t a fucking pity party.” 

“No pity,” Katsuki repeated. Then: “…do you still want me to braid your hair?”

Yuri choked on his shot, and spat half of it all over himself and the other half on the floor. Then he actually started laughing, properly laughing, snot and tears and everything. “Yuuri, I’m really glad you came tonight.”

“You…came to my room…?”

Yuri waved a hand in the air. “Do it. Braid my hair. If you pull on it you’re _dead_ , Katsudon.”

Katsuki laughed. “It’s okay, I’m pretty good.”

Yuri turned so that Katsuki could reach his hair, and they fell into a comfortable silence while Katsuki ran his fingers through it to get the tangles out, then started braiding and unbraiding it and re-braiding it, as if for the movement and not with any end goal in mind. Yuri could feel himself getting sleepy, but he didn’t want to fall asleep yet.

“So if I get pills do you think that would make it better?” Yuri asked. He wasn’t that keen on the idea of medication, but hey, if it got him through a few more years.

“You talk to a therapist or psychiatrist first,” Katsuki said. “I—I don’t want to give you advice that will backfire on you. I…I think a lot of professionals would tell you to end your deal first. I had to see a specialist to certify that there wasn’t a loophole when I first sought help in America. And…Yuri, you’re a minor. They might insist on telling your guardian.”

“Right,” Yuri said. “I…appreciate you telling me that to my face. Not…not many people would.”

“I’d…I’d like you to be able to come with me, any time you want to,” Katsuki said. 

“Yeah, well, maybe I will,” Yuri said. This was getting too touchy-feely again. “Are my braids any good? Are they done?”

“Why?” Katsuki asked.

“I need to post a photo to Instagram, duh,” Yuri said.

“Do you want me to….?”

Yuri already had his phone out, and scrolled through a bunch of useless notifications, and three texts from Mila asking where he was. She didn’t seem terribly worried, which meant informing her that he was alive via Instagram was acceptable. 

He angled his head to the left, and snapped a picture. Currently only half of his hair was in braids, and the other half was sticking out at weird angles. His cheeks were rosy, probably the alcohol kicking in already. He scrolled through a couple of filters, then decided it was fine as it was. He typed out "all Katsudon’s fault _#yuriexclusivevictoryparty_ " for the caption, which seemed quite clever in his current state of mind, and—

“Yurio?”

“What?”

“I…I really think you shouldn’t post that.”

“Why?”

Katsudon took a deep breath. “You’re drunk right now and I think you would be really, really mad at me in the morning if I let you post that.”

Yuri huffed, and sent it as a direct message to Mila instead.

> _ktsudon wouldn’t le t me post it_
> 
> _oh my god are you drunk?_

He tried a bit harder to get the letters right.

> _what does it matter to you, hag?_
> 
> _yuuri just saved your life, also I can’t believe you didn’t come and get drunk with me instead  
>  who won the dance-off this time?_
> 
> _shut up_
> 
> _you’re going to have such a terrible hangover tomorrow_
> 
> _shut up!!!!!_
> 
> _come find me so I can laugh at you_  
> 

“Mila thinks it’s funny.”

“She seems very nice,” Katsuk—Katsudon said. 

(Katsudon deserved a nickname at this point. After all, he’d successfully braided Yuri’s hair.)

“She is. She’s a great skater too. She helps me practice my choreography sometimes. She thought I had an eating disorder because I was acting weird,” Yuri said. “She’s been taking me to lunch every day.”

“Wow, that’s so…that’s so nice. I’m so—I’m glad you have her, too.”

They were in the realm of awkward small-talk about Yuri’s rinkmates now, apparently. “So are Victor and the mutt okay?” he asked, because he had been wondering.

“Huh? Oh,” Katsudon said. “Makkachin is fine, Victor texted me.”

“Hmph,” Yuri said.

“Do you not…like dogs?” Katsudon said.

“They smell like dog,” Yuri said. “And Makkachin slobbers all over everyone’s faces, all the time, and usually Victor will try to stop her except he seems to think it’s especially funny when Makkachin does it to _me_.” Katsudon was still looking at him. “I’m glad the mutt isn’t dead, though.”

“I didn’t…did you see Makka often?” Katsudon asked.

“Victor would invite me over to dinner sometimes,” Yuri said. “Or to, like, hang out and watch a movie. I wasn’t the youngest kid who moved to St. Petersburg to train with Yakov, but Dedushka didn’t move with me, and I wasn’t there to make friends, so I didn’t get out much. Victor, Mila, and Georgi eventually all took pity on me or something.” He took another shot.

“Oh,” Katsudon said, looking down again. 

_Yuuri didn’t know anything about what Victor was like before he moved to Japan,_ Yuri realized.

“Victor can’t cook for shit,” Yuri said. “He doesn’t really play video games. He doesn’t like board games either, because he hates losing but he also hates how cutthroat he becomes to win. The stupider the television show, the more he likes it, and even more when he can drag other people like my sorry ass to watch it with him, because what he really likes is when people _react_. I figured that part out too late, well after he decided I was his favorite person to watch stupid things with. When he walks Makka, that’s his quiet thinking time. He’s terrible to take shopping because he gets distracted by anything shiny or expensive so if you ever want to actually get something it’s impossible and takes forever. He’s always skating in his head. Composing. I think that’s the part that he likes the most.”

“Oh,” Katsudon said. “I didn’t realize you were so close.”

“Clearly, we weren’t,” Yuri said, and it came out more bitter than he meant it to. Katsudon looked _absolutely devastated,_ like Yuri had just kicked a puppy in front of him or something.

“I don’t—I don’t hate you for taking him away,” Yuri said. “But Victor was a part of the family, you know? He was stupid and aloof and an airhead and he practiced long after everyone else was gone and he ignored us and he did whatever he wanted and he’d smile and laugh and wave everything off but he was _one of us._ ”

“I didn’t—I didn’t mean to, I didn’t know he would come.”

Yuri rolled his eyes. “I know, that’s why I don’t hate you.” 

Katsudon draped an arm around his shoulder, and he half-heartedly tried to push it off just to keep up appearances, then forcibly grabbed it and dragged it back into place when Katsudon seemed to take that as a signal that he wanted space.

“I’m gonna beat you so hard in the Grand Prix Finals,” Yuri said.

“You can try,” Katsudon said.

“Good,” Yuri said. “No crying, no wimping out. You skate your best.”

“Thank you,” Katsudon said. “You know, you’re really nice too.”

“You’re delusional,” Yuri said.

“You just express it—“

“Don’t,” Yuri said. “Just. Don’t. Because I’m not. I drive Yakov up the wall. I call Mila a hag, and Victor an old geezer. I yell at you. I yell at everyone. All the time. Even when they’re _actually_ being nice to me. I…I hate _Agape_ so much because I just…sometimes I think of my grandfather and I think I remember what it felt like, and sometimes I just…I can’t. And I don’t know if it’s because I don’t have a soul or if I’m actually just an asshole and used that as an excuse to never grow up and one day my talent or ambition or whatever isn’t going to be enough and everyone’s going to see me for what I really am—which is—is not worth it—and—and they’re going to leave and I’m going to be another—another pathetic burn-out who never made it.”

There they were. All the _feelings._ Except they still felt just as much poison now that he’d spewed them out as they had been keeping them in.

“You never yelled at my mother,” Katsuki said. “Never once, when you were visiting. You were always polite to her. And to Yuuko. She’s always so happy when you text her, did you know that? And you flew all the way out from Russia because you were worried a stranger made a deal to compromise Victor’s free will—“

“oh my _god, he told you_ —“

“—even at great cost to yourself, both financially, and in terms of disrupting your training for your senior debut. You taught me the quad Salchow when I asked, even though I was your opponent. Maybe you drive Yakov up the wall, and call Mila a hag, and Victor an old geezer, and you yell a lot, but I think when things really matter, you’re there for people. You’re there for them like it was never a question in the first place. And they can see that. And they’ll be there for you too.”

There were a lot of things that Yuri wanted to say, from shouting “bullshit” to maybe stomping on Katsudon’s face then shouting “bullshit,” but what came out instead was a tiny, meek, “You really think so?”

“I’ll be there,” Katsudon said. “I promise.”

“You barely _know_ me,” Yuri said.

Katsudon’s forehead wrinkled a bit as he tried to wring the right words out of thin air. “I…sometimes I feel like I know you a lot better than I have the right to, because of…because of whatever we can do. Your emotions are always moving around you and I can see them just like you can see me. And it’s hard not to feel like you know someone when you can see them like that. I also…please don’t think that I pity you, because I don’t. But I really wish that someone had been there for me when it started to sink in that five years was a very long time to be without a soul. I had friends who would listen, and who were determined to support me no matter what, but there was no one who really _understood_. I didn’t know what was going to happen to me. It sometimes feels a lot worse even though I’ve gotten my soul _back_ , because I still don’t know what’s going to happen to me. What’s going to stay, what might fade away. There was no one else who had ever been through anything close to what I had experienced. Only there was, and now there is, so Yuri, I…I really hope that we can be friends.”

Yuri froze, trying to process what had just been said, and—and—and Katsudon looked like a deer in the headlights, resigned to its fate, and—

“Of course we’re friends, dumbass,” Yuri said, before anyone could get all sappy and teary-eyed. “I let you touch my hair.”

Katsudon laughed. Thank god. The air around him—didn’t quite lighten so much as began to resemble patches of sunlight shining out, illuminating everything from within.

“You’re literally lighting up, you’re such a sap.”

“Who’s to say that you aren’t, too?”

“I can’t believe you, never talk to me again.”

Katsudon stared at him silently.

“…you know I didn’t mean that, right? Keep talking to me.”

Katsudon laughed again. “We should probably get at least a little sleep.”

“What time is it?” Yuri asked.

“Past one in the morning,” Katsudon said.

“Oh.” A part of Yuri was exhausted, but another part of him really didn’t want this conversation to end, because then the two of them would go back to being…to being Yuri and Yuuri, the opponents, a rivalry played up by the media, and whatever Yuri had said about telling Victor they bonded he also really didn’t want to explain any of this to Victor, and just…daylight tended to poke holes in things. And Yuri didn’t want this to end.

“Hey,” Katsudon said. “I promise we can do this anytime you want, okay? I will braid your hair after the Gran Prix Final.”

“Promise?” Yuri asked, because he was _drunk_ , which meant he got to say everything he wanted, no shame.

“Promise,” Katsudon said.

___________________________________________

Yuri felt like hell crusted over when he rolled awake at nine out of Victor’s unused bed, less because of any actual hangover and more because of all the sweat and hair gel and crying that he would utterly deny happened. Katsudon was sitting on his own bed, freshly showered, and Yuri was ready to kill him for it.

"Do you want to get breakfast?" Katsudon asked. 

"I guess there's a nice bakery nearby," Yuri said. "Gimme a minute, I need to wake up. You're buying."

What Yuri _really_ wanted to do was shower, but he wasn't in his own room and he didn't have any of his own clothes, so he settled with splashing water on his face. He stared at himself in the bathroom mirror for a moment, clutching the edge of the sink as if it were the only thing holding him up, then he sighed and dropped his head. "Okay, I'm ready," he called.

Katsudon was pulling a coat on. Yuri grabbed his hoodie, shrugged it over his shoulders, and kicked his sneakers onto his feet. "Well? Are you coming? You're buying me coffee, too."

Katsudon took his time actually putting on his shoes, and Yuri rolled his eyes. He wanted that coffee, and he wanted it now. He checked his phone. A text from Yakov reminding him and Mila that they should start getting ready for the exhibition skate at 5:00, because Yakov both knew and planned for them being asked to skate in the exhibition gala whenever he made travel arrangements, but also he knew that the two of them liked to romp around the city shopping or visiting old haunts whenever they had the chance, and stopping them was a futile affair. Which meant that Yuri could get breakfast with Katsudon easily.

It was a brisk walk to the bakery, and a cafe right next door, and Yuri dragged Katsudon into the cafe first to get a small black coffee before they went to the bakery proper. Katsudon looked like he was going to protest all the trouble when the cafe had perfectly good pastries, but his mouth closed the moment they walked through the bakery door and he smelled the air.

In Yuri’s rather forceful opinion, nothing could beat a bona fide Russian bakery. He was glad that Katsudon agreed.

A minute later, they were settled at a table, Katsudon with a vatrushka and Yuri with a plate of syrniki. Yuri had his coffee to sip, and dip the syrniki into, which meant that the silence didn’t feel awkward yet.

“You know, I realized that I never gave you any of the actual advice that you asked for,” Katsudon said.

“What do you mean?” Yuri asked.

“The…practical things. That helped every day. Surviving five years,” Katsudon said.

“Oh,” Yuri said, and stared down at his coffee.

“Talking to Phichit and a therapist helped,” Katsudon said. “So did keeping busy. Celestino gave me a key to the rink so that I could go sometimes and practice if it got really bad. He made me text him before and after, though, to stay safe, and I tried not to use it that much. Usually it was easier to go a bit early or stay a bit late. I’m not—I don’t skate well when people are watching. But when it’s just me on the rink, I feel a lot more free.”

“Cooking helped too. My mother taught me, and I—I’d cook, when I got stressed, and I _knew_ that it helped, so even when it didn’t feel like it would I’d start out of habit and by the end I felt better. Phichit and I would either give it away at the rink or in the dorm, so everyone liked us.”

He took a deep breath. “And when it got…when I felt…I…I tried to imagine that I wasn’t empty, that I was building my own soul instead. And I filled it with everything precious to me. Skating. Phichit. Memories of home, and of my mother’s katsudon. Like getting to eat it when I won a competition, because I _knew_ it was good. So I could hold on to that. It sounds silly, but it really did help.”

Yuri thought of how Potya would curl up on his chest every day no matter how shitty he felt, how his grandfather would call every week no matter what. How skating felt like flying when he was midair in a jump and his mind finally went silent. How Yakov had practically adopted him, how Mila would tease him. How Lilia would give him a small nod not just after he skated, but after he did little things as well, with a look of pride on her face. What it felt like every time his grandfather brought him pirozhki. 

This weird tentative bond that was growing between him and Katsudon.

“Yeah,” he said. “That doesn’t sound stupid. Thanks.” Then, before he could think it through and thus stop himself: “You know, I was wrong about you, Katsudon.”

“Hm?”

“Not gonna say it twice. I’ve changed my mind. I want Victor to marry you and then you to move to St. Petersburg and stay here forever.” 

Katsudon _choked,_ and turned beet red.

Yuri grinned, because this was fun. “No? You’re right, you’re far too good for Victor, well in that case dump him and Yakov will be your coach. Yakov’s far better at the actual coaching part.”

Okay now Katsudon was coughing and Yuri was starting to get worried. But he was also laughing, and Yuri wasn’t sure if he’d ever seen anyone laugh this hard in his life, and he didn’t really want Katsudon to stop.

“Seriously, though,” Yuri said, only half seriously. “If you ever want to come to Russia, I’d yell at Yakov until he lets you on our rink. Or threaten to quit or something.”

Katsudon stopped laughing, which would have been a tragedy except now he was glowing. “Thank you,” he said.

“Whatever,” Yuri said. “How much time do you have before your flight?”

“It leaves in…” Katsudon checked his phone. “Five hours? I should get there three hours early. That gives me at least an hour before I should pack and head out.”

Stupid responsible Japanese man who wasn’t going to miss his flight.

“Alright, that gives us enough time to hit the Red Square, at least,” Yuri said. “I’m going to take you to as many of the best places in town as we can squeeze in.”

Katsudon looked so endearingly confused. “Why?”

“Because I know _exactly_ how excited Victor was to show you all of the wonders of his home country properly,” Yuri said. “So I’m going to show you them _first_.”

“I—“

“We’ll post photos on Instagram, it’ll be the perfect revenge for him running off to Japan,” Yuri said. “Come on. Pleeeeeeease?”

Yuri knew for a fact that no one could resist him when he made puppy-dog eyes at them. And with the rapidly deteriorating hesitance on Katsudon’s face, he also knew that today was not the day he would be proven wrong.

___________________________________________

> **yuri-plisetsky** first time seeing the red square _#KatsukiYuuri #RedSquare #Moscow #Russia_

> **yuri-plisetsky** katsudon trying @v-nikiforov’s favorite verhuny from a street vendor _#KatsukiYuuri #verhuny #desserts #food #Moscow #Russia #SorryVictor #DidntSaveYouAny_

> **yuri-plisetsky** hitting all the cathedrals _#KatsukiYuuri #Moscow #Russia_

> **yuri-plisetsky** neskuchny garden in the winter is mostly just snow but katsudon insisted _#KatsukiYuuri #NeskuchnyGarden #Moscow #Russia_

> **yuri-plisetsky** ending the day at the kremlin _#KatsukiYuuri #Kremlin #Moscow #Russia_

___________________________________________

It was nearly eleven by the time he got to Mila’s room, which was a bit late even for her, but he’d texted her ten minutes ago and she said she was still there, so whatever. He still fell like hell crusted over. He knocked, and she answered immediately. 

“I’m here, you wanted to make fun of me?” he said.

Mila looked down at him. “You’re not miserably hung over, this isn’t as fun as I thought it would be.”

“Shut up, I’m as miserable as I want to be, hag,” Yuri snapped.

Mila grinned. “That’s the spirit!”

“Take me shopping and then we’re going to buy the cheapest, greasiest food we can find,” Yuri demanded.

A worried expression flashed across Mila's face. "Are you sure you're alright?" she said.

"No," Yuri said. He pushed past her. "I'm using your shower."

The water was hot and the pressure was good, which was all that Yuri needed. He found one of the little packaged soaps unopened and scrubbed himself over with that, and Mila had left her own shampoo and conditioner in there which Yuri took as a signal to help himself, and ten minutes later he felt a lot more human. He wrapped his hair in one towel and his body in another because he _still_ didn’t have clothes, but Mila was Mila and they shared all the time. There was something about oversized women’s clothing that Yuri could pull off really, really well.

Apparently, Mila had done him one better, as his suitcase was waiting for him, all neat and stuff. He dug around in it for some underwear, then specifically stole some of Mila’s leggings and a sweater out of spite.

“So, food first, or shopping?” Mila asked.

Yuri paused. “Shopping. I’m not hungry.”

“Did you get breakfast?” Mila asked.

“Yeah,” Yuri said. Then, as he remembered that Mila was probably trying to keep an eye on him for fictitious eating problems, “Katsudon and I went to a bakery.”

Yuri thought that he said it nonchalantly, but Mila’s gaze was sharp. “Katsuki gets a nickname now?”

Yuri shrugged.

Mila put her hands on her hips. “I thought you hated him.”

“Can we drop this?” Yuri said.

“You know, I did check Instagram this morning.”

“Whatever, that was to spite Victor.”

“And I _know_ it wasn’t him who suggested that the two of you get drunk and have a sleepover last night, he’s notoriously reclusive,” Mila said. 

“I wanted to talk to him, so what,” Yuri said. “He asks less annoying questions than you.”

“Yuri…” Mila bit her lip. “He…you have to know that he and Victor…”

“He and Victor _what_?”

“They’re…I don’t think they’re going to break up soon,” Mila said. “And even if they did, Katsuki is nine years older than you.”

A beat, then it sunk in what Mila was trying to say.

“ _WHAT?!?_ No, I don’t—I don’t _like_ Katsudon like—ew, no, just gross, how did you even—“

“I know it can be hard to admit, but it’s natural at your age to—“

“No no no, just _no_ , how could you even _think_ that—“

“It makes sense, you’ve been obsessing over him ever since you got back from Japan, I can’t _believe_ I didn’t put it together sooner—“

“Shut UP!” Yuri shouted, and she did, at least for a moment. “I don’t like him like that, okay! I had something serious that I wanted to ask him! And I didn’t want to do it sober! And he took me seriously, and he answered me seriously, so just—shut up!”

“You can’t just _say_ that and leave me hanging,” Mila said. 

_I talked to Phichit_ , Katsudon had told him. _And it helped a lot._

Yuri took a deep breath. 

“My grandfather is getting old,” he said. “And he…and his health. It’s a…you can make open-ended deals to help with that sort of thing. And Katsuki had advice about surviving one for a long time.”

“Oh,” Mila said. 

“So. Yeah. I asked Katsudon.”

It wasn’t quite confessing to her, but it was closer than he had ever been to telling anyone else before.

“How could you tell?” Mila asked. 

“I see deals over people, remember?” Yuri said. “That’s why I hated him a lot at first. He had a really big one hanging over his head. And then when Victor ran off, I was worried. But it turned out that he just didn’t want his family’s inn to close but he had to go and insist that it wasn’t at the loss of any of the other inns in town, so it cost him.”

“Oh,” Mila said. 

“Can we drop this now?”

“Of course,” Mila said. “Is that why you’ve…”

“Shopping,” Yuri growled.

It’s not like the Moscow options were _that_ much better than St. Petersburg, just when they were training with Yakov, there was hardly time to do anything else, and days off tended to be spent nursing sore muscles or catching up on sleep. At least, for Yuri they were. Sometimes he thought that Mila had infinite reserves of energy, with how she managed to go clubbing at all.

Either way, they took turns dragging one another to different places that caught their attention. Yuri had gotten silver and Mila had gotten gold, so they did have a bit of prize money to throw around, but mostly Yuri liked trying on ridiculous clothes and only getting the ones that Mila winced the most at, and Mila loved staring at purses and trying on makeup and making _Yuri_ try on makeup and apparently this time searching for the perfect souvenir to bring back Cute Brunette. They stopped and got fried blini with ham and cheese for lunch and Yuri let her talk him into getting one of the eyeliners she tried out on him and gladly purchased a leopard-print purse that was in the displays of one of the stores Mila chose on her turn. They got back to the hotel just at the cusp of five, which gave them enough time to drop their haul off in their respective rooms and meet Yakov in the lobby. Mila’s exhibition skate was to some cutesy Disney song about not worrying or something. Yuri’s was _Angel of the Fire Festival_ , also choreographed by Lilia, which was graceful and elegant and he loved it, even if it was a bit reminiscent of his free skate. They went to bed early, because Yakov had booked them a flight at an unholy hour in the morning.

Yuri felt a bit lighter. Almost normal. Like he could maybe do this after all.

___________________________________________

> **yuri-plisetsky** back in St Petersburg, have your regularly scheduled picture of Potya _#CatsOfInstagram #nomyaccountwasnothacked #thankyoufortheconcern_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mila in her exhibition skates to a remix of Hakuna Matata that I imagine sounds something like this, although not quite as long: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRHCCDzMFCg>
> 
> I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


	7. l-word

There was about a month between the Rostelecom Cup and the Grand Prix Final.

Yuri competed, and took gold, in the Golden Spin of Zagreb. He had the congratulatory texts from Katsudon and Yuuko to prove it. Katsudon had taken to texting him pictures of food, usually the "healthy" stuff that his parents prepared him as a skater's diet, although there was a picture of a pork cutlet bowl for him after Zagreb. Yuri, in turn, texted back the huge platter of pirozhki he managed to successfully make, as well as Lilia and Yakov's huge smiles as they all crowded around the table to eat them. Yakov gave him workout regimes designed to improve his stamina, and Mila did ballet with him.

The time still passed too quickly. There were still too many—too many nights where he couldn’t sleep. He kept glued to his phone, because texting back with Katsudon actually helped sometimes. It just made it so—it meant that if something _happened_ to him, at least one person would know.

They were leaving St Petersburg for Spain far too quickly. All Yuri could think was, _I'm not ready._

There weren’t any fans waiting screaming to greet them at the airport in Barcelona. It was just Yuri and Mila again, of all of Yakov’s skaters that he trained, they were the only two who made it. And Yakov and Lilia, of course. Yakov had half-heartedly suggested that Mila and Yuri could room together at the hotel, and the look that Mila gave him could have melted lead, so they had gotten separate rooms, and Yakov and Lilia of course were getting separate rooms, and usually Yuri wouldn’t care except there was a part of him that was counting all the money, because what if something happened to him and he couldn’t skate anymore, then it was only his savings which weren’t really that substantial that would be supporting him and his grandfather.

The two of them had been living off government grants for skating since his novice days. 

The prize for winning gold at the Grand Prix Final in senior division was $25,000 USD. That could—that could help them both hold out for a little while, but not years. There was always European and Four Continents, and then Worlds. Those has a bit more winnings, for gold. But after travel and costume and coaching fees—

Yuri wondered when it had stopped being about skating and started being about money. Probably since getting on the ice had started to feel like his limbs were all weighed down and he was _exhausted_ before he even started to move.

He didn't remember that checking his phone was a thing he could do until they got to the hotel, and the texts were the thing that he noticed immediately, because

**Katsudon**

> _okay so  
>  this probably sounds stupid but I am definitely freaking out_
> 
> _about the Grand Prix Final_
> 
> _what if everything so far this season has been a fluke?  
>  i've never been that good of a skater and now a lot of people are  
>  counting on me and they expect me to be something that I'm not? _
> 
> _looks like anxiety can still get to me after all (＃＞-＜)_

God, Yuri hated the fact that he must have been on the plane when Katsudon had texted him.

**Katsudon**

> _of course anxiety doesn't go away you idiot_
> 
> _it's anxiety  
>  it doesn't get to be about reasonable stuff or come at convenient times_
> 
> _for what it's worth you're a really fucking good skater_
> 
> _I wouldn't mind getting silver against you_
> 
> _don't tell anyone I said that  
>  I'm still gonna beat your ass_
> 
> _just, like, go sightseeing or something_
> 
> _take your mind off shit and enjoy being here_
> 
> _I guarantee if you take Victor shopping not only will you forget about  
>  skating but you'll also get a workout carrying all his bags_

Katsudon wasn't answering, which probably meant he was asleep, but still, Yuri was kind of pissed. Katsudon deserved to be okay. Yuri hoped he was okay.

"Yuri, at last check yourself in," Yakov was whining at him, which means they must have reached the front of the line.

Fuck that.

"You do it, Yakov, I'm tired," he said without ever looking up from his phone, and took about two steps away from his baggage before he ran into the _mob of screaming fangirls._ “Can I get a photo with you?” “Yuratchka!!!” “Autograph, please!”, and, of course, unintelligible squealing. It was _loud_ , it was so loud, Yuri was starting to feel dizzy.

“You—“ he said and was probably going to fill in a bunch of choice curse words after it when Lilia cut him off with a “Yuri Plisetsky, don’t use unattractive words,” and that was exactly the point where he knew that he wasn’t going to get out of taking a bunch of pictures with them.

He stood as stiffly as possible as the girls all moved around him, he didn’t even say anything when someone put cat ears on his head, he didn’t get what the whole obsession with cat ears was, like, sure, he liked leopard print and posted pictures of Potya a bunch but that didn’t really excuse his fan club for fixating on it and from the looks of them making cat ears a required staple of the uniform? He’d throw it in the trash as soon as he got to his room, but right now, he forced a grimace and pretended it was a smile so that maybe he could get this over with and rest.

“Wow, he’s so popular,” came a voice from behind the crowd.

“Yuri’s Angels are famous,” came a _completely_ and _utterly_ terrible voice that Yuri recognized although he wished he didn’t.

What the _fuck_ was JJ doing here?

(Well, besides checking into the official Grand Prix Final hotel that all the skaters and their coaches and retinues were staying at.)

“Huh. But JJ Girls are better about following the rules, and we’re cuter,” came the woman’s voice again.

Yuri whirled around. “Don’t diss my fans and call them ugly, you ugly-ass bitch!” 

“So scary,” the woman said, leaning in closer to JJ and it was like come the fuck on, PDA much? “Help, JJ.”

“Oh, he’s just jealous because my fiancée is so beautiful,” JJ said. He looked like a complete and utter idiot standing there leaning into her with his dumb sunglasses on top of his head.

“Any guy who wears sunglasses on his head is scum,” Yuri told her. “Find someone better, ugly-ass bitch.”

(Lilia was pointedly not looking at him and Yuri _knew_ that she was going to have words with him later.)

“Hey, don’t be so uppity,” JJ said, but he was smiling, like this whole exchange was in good fun and they were friends who teased each other all the time. Then his eyes focused on someone behind Yuri. “Otabek! Where are you going?”

Yuri whirled around to see another…skater? Friend of JJ’s? Whatever, he wearing all monochrome gray and black and white and even a scarf like someone who spent millions of hours and dollars trying (and succeeding) to be effortlessly fashionable, and _also_ douchebag sunglasses, walking past them. 

“Out to eat.”

His curtness didn’t seem to bother JJ at all. “Eating alone? You’re still an odd one, huh? Want to join us for dinner?”

“Thanks, but I’ll pass,” Otabek said, except he wasn’t looking at JJ. He was staring at Yuri.

Really, really intently. 

Yuri tried not to shiver. Katsudon could see demon deals, but that was because he’d been under the effects of one for five years. And even though the deal was gone, Yuri could still see its effects lingering over him. Otabek was clean, there was _absolutely nothing_ to indicate that he’d gone through the _years_ that it would take to merit the sort of stare that was a ‘I can tell you have a massive demon deal looming over your head’ stare. 

Which meant this was a ‘you’re my rival and I’m going to beat you’ stare? Or maybe a ‘through an inevitable rude encounter that Yuri didn't even remember he had managed to piss him off’ stare?

“What’s with you, asshole?” Yuri spat, because if he’d already pissed the guy off no use wasting energy being polite. Otabek just turned and walked off.

“Come on,” Yakov said, and he allowed himself to be corralled to the elevators when his phone buzzed.

**Katsudon**

> _just_
> 
> _’now that I know what love is and am stronger for it,  
>  I’ll prove it to myself with a Grand Prix Final gold medal’_
> 
> _I can’t believe how stupid it was to say that_
> 
> _yeah it was pretty stupid_
> 
> _you’ll still do fine though_

”This is your keycard,” Yakov said. “This is your floor. Now get some sleep.”

**Katsudon**

> _Victor and Chris have attacked me_
> 
> _they went swimming and they are cold_
> 
> _I am not a personal space heater  
>  but they did not get that memo_
> 
> _help_
> 
> _you’re on your own with that one_
> 
> _maybe they’re ticklish?_
> 
> _I don’t start fights I can’t win_

Katsudon didn’t seem to be answering anymore, so Yuri switched over to Instagram. There were pictures of Victor and Chris by the pool, on Chris’s account. A fuck-ton of selfies with Yuri’s Angels that he’d been tagged in. He was scowling in every single one of them.

He took Yakov’s advice and tried to get some sleep.

___________________________________________

The male singles skaters had access to the practice rink the next morning. Yuri ran through his programs a couple of times, although nothing too strenuous. None of the jumps with arms raised. He didn’t want to do something stupid like fall and twist an ankle the day before the competition, not when there was nothing he could do to _fix_ it.

Katsudon and Victor stuck to their side of the rink, and Yuri didn’t go over. He wasn’t quite sure how to face Victor in person. Hell, he wasn’t quite sure how to face _Katsudon_ in person. 

JJ was the first to announce that he was done with practice, and Yuri was ready to make a biting comment when Yakov shouted at him to run _Agape_ one more time, and by the time he was done, JJ was long gone, and Katsudon and Victor had already cleared the ice.

“Tell Mila I’m taking a shower and she can text me wherever for lunch,” he told Yakov, and headed back towards the hotel. The way the facilities were set up, it was walking distance from the rink, which was pretty nice. He had to jog a bit at the end to avoid a small clustered group of people who could have been Yuri’s Angels, but otherwise, things went smoothly. 

Mila sent him a location, and it was close enough to the hotel that he made the fatal mistake of deciding to walk, because the group that he dodged on the way in most certainly _were_ Yuri’s Angels and they spotted him even though he had his hood up. Which was how he was running through the streets (thank god for Yakov’s new regime for his stamina because at least he could sprint around the city like nobody’s business), but even as he ducked into an alleyway to catch his breath he knew he was doomed.

At least three of the Angels had demon deals hanging over his heads. They _always_ made deals so they could find him, and yeah, sure, he could run, but he couldn’t hide from the supernatural influence.

“Where’s Yuratchka. We’re about to have a fan meeting,” came one voice. (What did they need him for to have a fan meeting? _He_ wasn’t a fan of himself. Was he supposed to approve group cheers or something? Only a complete asshat like JJ would do that.)

“I can smell Yuratchka! It’s coming from over here!” Yup, that one had a demon deal going.

“Oh, this hair is Yuratchka’s!” Either demon deal or just utterly obsessive, that one could go either way.

Crap, how was he going to get himself of of this?

And then suddenly there was the roar of a motorcycle engine and JJ’s weird friend from the prior day had pulled up behind him.

“Yuri, get on.”

“Huh?”

His rabid fans rounded the corner, or rather, one of them in particular, who screeched “There’s Yuratchka” so that the rest of them could come running.

(Another screeched “No way! It’s Otabek Altin from Kazakhstan!”, as if Yuri didn’t know who he was facing.)

Otabek threw a helmet at him. “Are you coming or not?”

Yuri was pretty sure that Otabek wouldn’t be able to get away with murdering him before the competition, especially considering how half the fans who rounded the corner had their phones out and were filming this whole exchange, so if something happened to him, Otabek wasn’t going to have an easy alibi. And between the evil he did know and the evil he didn’t—

He got on the motorcycle.

___________________________________________

Otabek drove them incredibly carefully through the streets of Barcelona, which made sense, you weren’t going to stay a professional athlete for very long if you were recklessly driving motorbikes on the side. Yuri stared at the sky half the time and tried not to second-guess where they were going. Otabek was quiet, which was…nice. Yuri didn’t really know what to say. He didn’t know why this was happening. And he was glad he…didn’t have to explain himself.

They stopped at the Park Güell, which was as nice a place as any to wander around in peace in the city. Although it was pubic, and they’d definitely be _findable_ , which was kind of both a good thing and a bad thing, but Yuri wasn’t really worried. Otabek gave off such a strong vibe of ‘don’t mess with me’ that even if fans showed up, Yuri didn't think the two of them would be bothered. And this was far better than being taken somewhere creepy in the middle of nowhere.

Otabek led him to the top of the main terrace, where they could look out over the whole city, silently, and Yuri was just about ready to think that he was there for no reason at all when Otabek spoke. 

“You know, we’ve met before. Five years ago, we trained together at Yakov’s summer camp.”

“Really?” Yuri said.

Otabek grunted in response.

“I don’t remember that,” Yuri said, because what else was he supposed to do? If Otabek expected this to be some touching reunion or something, then he hadn’t known Yuri at all. Unless this was because Yuri had done something rude and terrible and Otabek was here to chew him out for it five years later.

“At the time, I was in my first year in the junior division,” Otabek said. “I couldn’t keep up with the Russian junior skaters, so I was put in the novice class. That’s where I met you. Yuri Plisetsky had the unforgettable eyes of a soldier.”

That was…surprisingly deep. And surprisingly not ‘I hate you.’

“A soldier?” Yuri said. “ _Me?_ ” The wind blew through his hair. It was getting longer, but he liked it longer. Liked how it hid his face. “I had just moved my home rink from Moscow to St. Petersburg. I was desperate. I decided that I wouldn’t complain until I was good enough.”

Otabek continued to stare out over the city. “After that camp, I moved around to train, from Russia to the US and then to Canada. I only managed to return to my home rink in Almaty last year. Now, more than ever, I want to win the championship for Kazakhstan.”

Which meant that Yuri was back to square one. “Otabek, why did you talk to me? I’m a rival, aren’t I?”

“I’ve always thought we were alike.” He turned towards Yuri for the first time in the conversation. “That’s all. Are you going to become friends with me or not?”

Which, oh fuck, what was he supposed to say to that?

Otabek stuck his hand out, which kind of solved his problem. He didn’t have to say anything, he just shook it instead, but Otabek smiled like he understood. Which was great, Yuri wasn’t too good at the whole communication thing, so he didn’t mind…just existing without talking too much.

It was nice. They turned back to the city and enjoyed the view and just existed. Yuri didn't have to _be_ anything or anyone. Otabek certainly wasn't trying to be anything or anyone. It was them and the breeze and the buildings below and the hum of conversation behind them, and Yuri was...happy.

A friend.

He hadn't had one of those since _Katsudon_ had come up to him and stammered that he hoped they could be friends. Otabek remembered him and wanted to be friends with him. God, what a strange world they lived in. What did someone even do with friends? Complain about things, maybe. Text each other. Although 'we should exchange numbers' seemed a bit forward considering that they had kind of just met and really didn't fit the mood of peaceful sightseeing in silence. Go shopping, he and Mila did that all the time, except Otabek's clothes all seemed high-end and really well put together and not the sort of ridiculous shit that was fun to buy, and Yuri was watching money right now. Go sightseeing to, like, other places? To be honest, Yuri didn't really care about Barcelona or Spain or whatever monuments people liked to take selfies with or anything. Maybe Otabek did.

As if on cue, Yuri's stomach rumbled.

Right. Fuck. He hadn't eaten, he had been planning on catching up with Mila before Otabek saved him from the fangirls.

**baba yaga**

> _hey I'm sorry I didn't mean to bail on you_
> 
> _it's okay  
>  you're with beka, right? _
> 
> _beka?!???  
>  do you know him? _
> 
> _no  
>  but you have cute nicknames for everyone  
>  if you haven’t given him one yet use ‘beka’ it’s cute_
> 
> _shut up hag_
> 
> _that’s the spirit_

He swiped to check the notification from another text.

**Katsudon**

> _Victor says he wants to burn my suit and tie that I used for the press conference_
> 
> _okay but they were terribly ugly_
> 
> _he might be an idiot but at least he has taste_

If Katsudon was shopping with Victor, he wasn’t going to be able to reply for a while.

**baba yaga**

> _I just thought you should know the headlines read  
>  ‘The fairy of Russia, Yuri Plisetsky, rides off on a motorbike with Otabek, the Hero of Kazakhstan’_
> 
> _If you were wondering how I knew where you were_
> 
> _why the fuck am *I* the fairy_
> 
> _have you seen your face?  
>  when you’re not scowling, that is_

Fucking Mila.

Then Yuri realized how incredibly rude he must look.

”Sorry, I…I was going to meet one of my friends for lunch,” he said, shoving his phone back into his pocket. “She’s off doing…stuff…so it’s not—yeah.”

Somehow the way that Otabek was looking at him made him feel simultaneously like the biggest idiot in the world, and not an stuttering idiot at all.

“Do you have a favorite food?” Otabek asked. “Something you’d like to eat?”

“Maybe somewhere that does tea or something?” Yuri said. “It’s going to be dinner in a few hours, and if I eat right now I won’t have an appetite and then Yakov will yell at me.”

"Alright," Otabek said. He made an 'after you' gesture, and Yuri headed off down the stairs of the terrace and towards where they left the motorcycle. Otabek kept pace with him easily.

Riding off to find food was with Otabek as meticulously safe as the trip to the Park Güell had been. Otabek exuded a firm confidence in his navigation, which meant that he'd either been here before, or done his research, or was just taking them around randomly with no end destination in mind and they'd be stopping at whatever place caught his eye, but he was doing it with such certainty that he seemed like a local.

Either way, Yuri didn't mind. He liked not having to choose. It was easier.

They got a little table by the window, and Yuri ordered tea and some sandwich that was pretty much all vegetables and stuff. He nibbled his way through half of it as he and Otabek waited for their tea to cool, and then pushed it aside to concentrate on his drink. 

"So, have you been here before?" he asked.

"Yes," Otabek said, and didn't elaborate.

"The mosaics were cool," Yuri said. "At the park, I mean."

Otabek nodded. "Gaudí designed all of the famous buildings in the city. Half of them are World Heritage sites. Güell commissioned him. Gaudí once told him they must be the only two men who liked his architecture, and Güell said, 'I don't like your architecture, I respect it.'"

"I respect that," Yuri said. "The—the quote, I mean. The architecture too. I'm not sure if I could like it, but I definitely respect it." God, he looked like such an idiot. "Sorry, architecture isn't really my thing."

"What is your thing?" Otabek was looking at him thoughtfully, like he'd just said something deep and he was about to say more deep stuff.

Fuck it.

"High fashion," Yuri said. "And music. And cats."

Otabek smiled. 

"High fashion means black leather and leopard print and anyone who tells you otherwise is lying," he continued. "But it's also about wearing what you want and not giving a fuck about what anyone else has to say. Unless you have shitty style, in which case let someone else dress you and don't subject the world to that sort of horror. You have good style though."

"I'm glad to hear," Otabek said.

"The worst thing is when people are _bland_ , you know?" Yuri said. "High fashion is about shoving your personality in everyone else's face so well that they already agree with you."

"Oh," Otabek said.

"What?"

Otabek just shook his head. "I think I understand that. So high fashion. Then music?"

"Punk rock music," Yuri said. "That's the best kind of music. I mean. There's a lot of great music out there. Lilia plays classical stuff all the house and it’s nowhere near as _boring_ as most people make it out to be. Most of the stories behind classical shit are intense. I’ve started getting into 20th century classical music, which is, like, not classical enough for Lilia, so I have to listen to it on my own. Which isn’t to say. I mean. I like punk-rock more. But I guess there are other cool things out there.”

“I like music,” Otabek said.

Yuri gave him a _look_. “Listen, buddy, you can either contribute or—“

“Contribute?” Otabek said. “Okay. Punk rock tends to be my thing more than classical, although I am familiar with a number of contemporary composers. Music…sticks in my head very easily. Once I’ve heard a few works from an artist I tend to be able to recognize songs of theirs anywhere. I make it my business to know music, because I DJ when I have the time. Usually in clubs that go for rock, although I’ve dabbled in EDM. My friends are more into that, and it’s all rage on the internet right now. I tend to keep that side of my life private, because I consider myself a representative of Kazakhstan and behavior such as clubbing isn't really setting a good example, but my friends have uploaded some clips of my gigs in Almaty on their private Instagrams. You’ll be able to see my work in my free skate. I don’t advertise it nor will it be announced, but I designed the re-arrangement of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 to include some electric guitar, bass guitar, and percussion underneath the traditional orchestra part to better convey the emotions that I wanted to express. Is that enough?”

Yuri’s jaw practically hit the ground. “That is so. Fucking. Cool.”

Otabek shrugged. “It’s a hobby.”

 _It's a hobby._ Fucking unreal.

“Show me!” Yuri said.

“What?”

“You’ve gotta have some of your stuff on your phone or something,” Yuri said. “So show me. Now.”

Otabek raised an eyebrow, but he still got his phone out, and handed Yuri a pair of earbuds. Yuri put them in expectancy, and Otabek hit play.

It took approximately ten seconds for Yuri to ascend into pure musical _heaven_. There was the strong underlying beat, even through basic mediocre earbuds Yuri could feel it rocking his bones, it was sounded like Immigrant Song except it was _so much more_ and if this wasn't the most incredible thing Yuri had heard in his life then he didn't know what was.

"Holy shit," he said when it was over.

"Led Zeppelin," Otabek said. "Old, but. The guitar riff of _Immigrant Song_ is maybe the most iconic sounds of all time. I wanted to pay tribute to that."

"You have more, right?" Yuri said.

Which was how their afternoon turned into an hour and a half of Yuri listening to every single track that Otabek had on his phone. Yuri extracted a promise from Otabek to send him the rest of his stuff, which, Otabek tried to protest that most of what one did as a DJ was read the crowd and blend intros and outros of stuff and not make their own remixes, but Yuri would hear none of it. He didn't remember enjoying music this much in _months_ , maybe _years._ Which clearly just meant that Otabek was that good. 

They eventually transitioned from music to cats, which meant that Yuri was showing off the several thousand pictures of Potya he had on his phone, when Katsudon and Victor came up to their table.

Yuri swallowed.

"I was wondering if you could do us a huge favor?" Katsudon asked. "Would you be willing to, um, get dinner with us?"

He glanced out the window, though, and Yuri followed his gaze, and Mari and Minako were standing outside with their faces pressed to the glass. 

So it was _that_ kind of favor.

Yuri made sure not to look at Victor at all. "Whatever, as long as they have good food. Otabek, you in?"

"Sure," Otabek said.

"Fan- _taaaa_ -stic," Victor said. Yuri tried not to glare too hard at the table. The table hadn't done anything wrong.

Dinner ended up being a restaurant a few streets down, with a nice open patio. Christophe joined them, which, judging from Minako's reaction, was 100% for her, and Phichit joined them, which, judging by how Katsudon kept glancing towards him as if for moral support every time anyone did something too loud or embarrassing for being _in public_ , was 100% for him. Yuri ended up sitting with Otabek on one side and Mari on the other. _They made banners for me,_ was all that he could think. _They made banners and Yuuko and the triplets helped._

Either way, Minako and Mari were clearly having the time of their lives. Mari grinned and shoved food at him with exclamations like "Yurio, have some shrimp!" which on any other occasion he would have made a fuss about, but it felt a little bit like being home, so he allowed it. It was pretty good shrimp. Chris smiled and winked a lot more than necessary, especially because he discovered that Minako would swoon and practically burst into tears at him _breathing_. Phichit filled all of the gaps in conversation with bubbly cheer, and took an ungodly amount of pictures, which, according to previous conversations Yuri had had with Katsudon, would all be surprisingly flattering and impeccable, and would also all show up on Instagram whether they liked it or not. Otabek was a blessed shrine of quietness in the chaos of it all. 

And Katsudon was _glowing._

He kept smiling at Yuri. He kept smiling at Phichit. He kept smiling at his sister and Minako. He kept looking around like he couldn't believe that he was _here_ , that they were all _here_ , and that them all being together was the greatest thing in the world.

And he kept smiling at Victor. Victor, who had only eyes for him, who was constantly angled a bit towards him, who looked constantly ready to drape himself over him. Victor, who smiled back at him every single time, which in turn would make Katsudon's smile a bit wider.

Back in Hasetsu, back at Hot Springs On Ice, Yuri had thought that Victor was in love, and that would be the end of it.

Here, sitting at this table, watching how much Katsudon smiled when he looked at all of them—

It was very clear that Katsudon was in love too.

The night finally, _finally_ started winding down. They went from eating the food to picking at it. The checks had come and gone with minimal fuss. Victor was drinking a mug of beer. Katsudon was laughing about something with someone when he looked around again and:

"Still, it’s kind of weird for us all to be here like this before the Final starts. At last year’s Final, I was always by myself, even at the banquet. I couldn’t even talk to Victor."

Whoops.

Victor spit his beer everywhere.

(Goddamnit they had gotten together, but of course Victor was too much of an idiot to have figured it out or freaking _talked_ about his feelings.)

"Yuuri, you don’t remember?" he sputtered, looking like a man who had just looked death in the eye.

"What?" Katsudon said.

"Yuuri, you got drunk on champagne and started dancing," Christophe said. "Everyone saw it."

 _Way to go, asshole,_ Yuri thought. _You don't have to tell the dude that clearly has social anxiety that 'everyone saw it.'_

"Huh?" Katsudon said, and he looked so confused.

"Whatever, it was disgusting as hell," Yuri said, trying to give Katsudon a look that conveyed the whole 'this is not a big deal, don't freak out about it, we've all moved on' thing that Katsudon really needed to get right now before anything escalated. "I was dragged into a dance-off and got humiliated, too."

"A dance-off? With Yurio?" Katsudon said.

"I did mine with a pole dance, half-naked," Chris chimed in.

If Yuri decided he was ever speaking with Victor again, they were really going to have to talk long and _hard_ about his choice of friends.

Katsudon threw his face into his hands. "I start going off the rails when I drink, just like my Kyushu born-and-bred dad, so I was trying to lay off, but…"

Victor held his phone to Katsudon's face. "I still have videos of what happened."

Christophe extended his to Phichit's. "I do too."

This was. a fucking. nightmare.

(Although, at least Katsudon seemed more embarrassed and less completely and utterly freaking out.)

"What? Yuuri, that's so dirty," Phichit said. Which, of course, made Minako and Mari crowd over behind them.

"Don't look! Please, cut it out already!" Katsudon said, so Victor leaned over and started showing Otabek.

"Isn't this amazing?"

Victor was going to be demoted to 'worst boyfriend of the year,' Yuri decided, and that was saying something because it was only December so Anya and Georgi had technically been together this year. Katsudon was panicking. Katsudon was definitely still panicking.

"You danced with Victor all night and then you asked him to come to Hasetsu and be your coach," Yuri said softly, but his voice cut across the table nonetheless. "That if you won one of your many stupid dance-offs with him, he would—he would go."

Katsudon's eyes widened. "I—I didn't—"

"It's been painfully obvious the whole time that you didn't know," Yuri said.

"But I—I—"

"It's fine," Yuri said, in a voice that said _drop it._ "I already told you it was fine. Victor's the idiot here."

Katsudon buried his face in his hands again. Which meant, unfortunately, something on his finger caught the light. As if the night couldn't get any worse.

"What's with the rings, you two?" Christophe said, gesturing to Katsudon and Victor.

Mari instantly looked up. "Rings? Huh?"

"I don't remember you wearing that," Minako cut in.

Katsudon clutched his hand, hiding the ring. "Um...this is..."

Which meant that Victor held his hand up, showing his off. "They're a pair!"

 _I was kidding when I told you to marry him,_ was the first thing to flash across Yuri's mind. Apparently, Phichit had the same idea, because he shouted "CONGRATS ON YOUR MARRIAGE!" then turned to the rest of the restaurant and at the same volume, "EVERYONE! MY GOOD FRIEND HERE JUST GOT MARRIED!"

The entire restaurant started clapping.

"N-no, this is, um…" Katsudon stuttered. "It’s to thank him for all his help…and lots of other things…yes, other things!"

Okay holy fuck Katsudon was not helping his own case.

"Yeah, don’t get the wrong idea," Victor said, and everyone went quiet for him. "This is an engagement ring. We’ll get married once he wins a gold medal. Right, Yuuri?"

"V-Victor!"

And suddenly the tension at the table was tangible enough that one could sink a hot knife through it.

"A gold…" Otabek started.

"…medal…" Phichit continued.

"…huh?" Chris finished.

Yuri huffed because this was a joke, this _had_ to be a joke, Victor was living with Katsudon so he _had_ to know how anxious and pressured Katsudon already felt about the Grand Prix Final, there was no way that he'd hinge their _marriage_ too on Katsudon winning gold.

"Um, well, um…" Katsudon said.

"WAIT A SECOND!" came the most annoying voice Yuri had heard in his life. _JJ to the rescue._ Wow. That was a sentence Yuri had never thought would cross his mind. "I’ll be the one who wins gold and gets married, of course!"

"That’s right, it’ll definitely be JJ," said his annoying fiancée, plastered to his side.

"Sorry we can’t congratulate you on that future marriage," JJ said.

"Well, tomorrow’s an early start, better call it a night," Victor said, and the entire party booked it.

"Huh, what? Hey, wait a second. I was just joking!" JJ's voice followed them, but they were already gone.

___________________________________________

Everyone split up when they got to the hotel, except Otabek, who stayed outside, so Yuri kind of nonchalantly lingered back with him. Because Otabek said they were friends, right? And after that train wreck of a dinner...

"You aren't heading inside with the others?" Otabek asked.

Yuri bristled. "I thought we were hanging out," he said, because it was supposed to be obvious. He was pretty sure that just kind of standing together in silence without having to acknowledge that it would be awkward if they were any other two people was their _thing_ , but if Otabek _called him out on it_ , then it was suddenly _awkward_ again.

“You might not want to see this,” Otabek said.

“You’re less boring than the hotel,” Yuri said. “You’re not going to scare me off, just do whatever you were going to do.” He hoped that Otabek wasn't going to smoke or something, that shit was terrible for a skater's lungs and he might actually have to bail rather than deal with second-hand smoke.

“I sell my soul the night before a competition to ensure that any injuries I might sustain will not be serious.” 

Great, wasn't smoke.

“Did I fucking stutter?”

Otabek smiled. “No, you didn’t.”

Yuri crossed his arms as if to say _then go ahead._

Otabek’s hands were steady as he drew the sigil with a practiced familiarity, all lines perfectly precise. He spoke words that Yuri was unfamiliar with. The darkness that drew itself together into a rough, roiling shape was a bit too familiar, though.

“I would trade three hours of my soul for protection tomorrow from any injuries that my performance on the ice might bring,” Otabek said. “I offer this trade in good faith. Do you accept it?”

“I accept it,” the demon said, sounding bored. 

Otabek cut his hand with a silver knife and carefully allowed three drops of blood to hit the center of the sigil. Then the demon was gone, Otabek’s hand was healed, except everything hadn’t disappeared fully, not to Yuri; a mantle of darkness settled around Otabek’s shoulders.

He wasn’t quite sure what to say. Something like ‘you’re a good enough skater that you probably don’t need to do that’ might come off as insulting, but standing around silently would also probably come off as insulting. And for some reason, he really didn’t want to insult Otabek.

“I got into a bad accident when I was fourteen,” Otabek said quietly. “I broke my femur in two places. I made a deal that lasted 500 days for my leg to be instantly and completely healed, so that I could go immediately back to the ice. It seemed prudent ever since to protect myself when I might be in danger.”

“Oh,” Yuri said.

Five hundred days. That was nearly a year and a half. He hadn’t _seen_ anything on Otabek, but maybe that was because Otabek wore leather jackets and rode a motorcycle and skated in such harsh, clean lines and even now the deal was seeping into his clothes and blending like it had never been there, because Otabek’s posture didn’t slip an inch. Like Otabek was too _strong_ to notice something as small or as inconvenient as a demon deal. Or maybe because it had been _years_ ago and these things faded in time, just like Katsudon’s faded when he wasn’t feeling anxious.

“You’re strong,” he said, because he didn’t want Otabek to get the wrong idea of him judging him or something.

Otabek just smiled. "I didn't have to do it. There were other things I could have pursued besides skating. But it seemed like the right decision at the time."

"Did you ever...regret it?" Yuri said.

"No." And he didn't elaborate.

"Cool."

Katsudon said that his vision had developed after _years_ , not a year and a half, and Yuri didn't really remember seeing that many people with deals until he was seven or so, but he hadn't thought much of it because he hadn't really interacted with that many people besides his grandfather before then, so it probably...he probably was safe from Otabek knowing. And Otabek would probably be cool about it.

"I wasn't particularly planning on staying out much later," Otabek said.

"Right," Yuri said. "Um. Good luck tomorrow."

"Sleep well, Yuri," Otabek said, and then they both headed in silently to their own rooms.

___________________________________________

Yuri meant to get ready to go to sleep when he finally got up to his blessedly empty single on the fifteenth floor, but he was tired, and he made the mistake of flopping on the floor to just lean on his bed and maybe check his phone, and then he couldn't get up.

He couldn't move at all.

It—it took him a moment to notice because at first he thought he was moving except he wasn't, he wasn't looking at his phone, his arm was by his side, and he kept trying to move it up and kept thinking he'd succeeded and then it just...hadn't moved and he was _confused._ Why hadn't his arm moved. He had moved it except he hadn't, over and over in a loop.

He stopped trying for...maybe it was a minute, maybe it was five, and then it occurred to him that this was bad and that he should be able to move and that he was just tired but not _too_ tired but it still didn't work.

The panic began to set in.

He could breathe. But everything else—he couldn't even move his eyes, he was just stuck staring at the same point on the wall—

He tried not to hyperventilate. Tried to gather all his energy, all his focus, just to move a limb. It wasn't—wasn't working, but he didn't let it distract him, he just concentrated everything on his left arm, trying to get even a _finger_ to twitch.

Nothing. It was like his mind was completely cut off from his body.

He kept trying. He kept trying as hard as he could. No one was going to come looking for him, not until tomorrow, no one would _help_ , so if he couldn't get himself up, couldn't—couldn't—he didn't know if this would pass or if this was it, this was the end—

He could feel tears prickling in the corners of his eyes as the exhaustion slowly overtook him and he could feel his very _panic_ about the _wrongness_ of the situation draining from him. Then there was...nothing. Just blankness. Nothing to animate him, nothing that mattered. He just...floated.

It was...maybe minutes, maybe hours, when he finally came back to himself. The awareness came first, and then, with great effort and not enough energy to be particularly emotionally invested in the result, he lifted his arm. And then his other arm. And then he pushed himself up, stumbled out of his shoes, and collapsed onto the bed.

He could reach his phone. He considered—considered texting Katsudon _hey, did you ever get stuck for a couple hours where you just literally physically couldn't move, is that a normal thing,_ except Katsudon was probably sleeping, and that was also a pretty huge bomb to drop on someone the night before the Grand Prix.

 _It didn't happen_ , he decided. _I was tired and sat down for a minute and fell asleep. Anything else was a bad dream. Nothing else happened._

He pushed himself up, actually ambled to the bathroom to wash his face and brush his teeth, changed into something sleepable in, and crawled back into bed.

_Just a bad dream._

___________________________________________

Yuri woke up at 6AM on the day of the competition.

It just kept replaying over and over in his mind, how nervous, how flustered, how _happy_ Katsudon had looked at the restaurant. Like there wasn’t a hole in him anymore. Like he was a little bit more complete, a little bit more of a person, like he had a _soul_ and it fit again and had finally started feeling like his instead of some blaze of otherworldly hellfire rooted in his chest, choking away his breath.

Yuri couldn’t fall back asleep, so he went for a walk by the water.

Of course he wasn’t the only one to have had this idea.

Victor.

God, just...him and Victor and everything that had become so broken between them. Yuuko texted. Katsudon texted. Mila texted, and hell, they shared the same rink.

Never once had Victor texted.

Never _once._

He...he wanted to hate Victor for this—this whole season. He wanted to, but it…was complicated.

He had been barely fourteen, his birthday less than two weeks before, swept up in practice for Worlds. It had been _inevitable,_ only it had to happen the morning before his free skate and he was in second place and he needed to get first and he just _had_ to flub a jump in practice and roll his ankle and there he had been, sitting in the locker room, crying, when everyone else was out to lunch, when Victor found him.

Victor hadn’t said anything, hadn’t asked any questions, had just kneeled in front of him and wrapped his ankle. 

“You’ve chosen a hard path,” Victor had mused, almost to himself more than Yuri. “But you’re a little fighter, aren’t you?”

(Of course Yuri was a fighter. And he’d won gold, Victor’s binding holding strong.)

No, Victor had the fatal flaw of being _stupidly kind_ at just the right—just the _wrong_ moments. And Yuri had fell for it, had felt, in _that_ moment, that there was no one else who could ever come as close to understanding him in his life.

“Victor Nikiforov is dead.”

Victor turned to look at him, with a sad smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “What is it, Yurio? Did you want to compete against me?”

“Don’t be so full of yourself,” Yuri spat. “Not all skaters look up to you.”

Victor didn’t say anything, just turned back to look at the ocean. And finally, _finally_ , Yuri felt his anger return. “Just don’t—don’t you dare hurt Katsudon, alright, he’s a _good_ person, he's so much better than—than you could—he’s been through so much more than you could ever imagine and for some stupid fucking reason you make him smile like he has a soul again and you can’t understand it but—you washed out and you _left_ and Katsudon is still there so don’t you dare fuck it up for him.” The words left him in a rush, and for some reason, there were tears prickling in Yuri’s eyes. Again. God, what was it with all these tears?

(Except Yuri knew.)

It wasn’t Victor anymore, when Yuri pictured someone who was _strong_ enough to skate like him, strong enough to pin his own dreams of being able to survive this mess onto.

It was Katsudon. 

“Yuuri gave a lot of us our L-word, didn’t he?” Victor said.

“Shut up, geezer,” Yuri said, but his heart wasn’t really in it. He turned to walk away, but before he could get more than ten paces— “This place reminds me of Hasetsu’s ocean.”

“I thought that too,” Victor said.

Yuri hoped that he wasn’t imagining the…tentative peace between them. He was burning out, things were collapsing faster than thought he’d be because he’d been fine for _years_ and then suddenly this season everything had come crashing down around him, but he was still Yuri Plisetsky, he was still going to win gold in his senior debut, and if he didn’t make it any further than these were the last words he properly exchanged with Victor, he wouldn’t regret them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> filler episodes are always fun
> 
> I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


	8. final, pt i

Katsudon was 6th in the rankings going into the Grand Prix, which meant he was skating first.

(Yuri was 4th, which was not very comforting in regards to his chances of taking gold here. Although he—he always pulled through when it counted, right?)

Either way, Katsudon was skating now. Victor kissed his ring before he went onto the ice. And Yuri…Yuri knew that this performance wasn’t going to be the same. Katsudon’s energy was _off_. He was determined, but he wasn’t glowing.

It was all JJ’s fault. Every skater here that was serious about gold had changed their jump compositions to be able to hold a flame to JJ’s base technical score, but right here, right now, it meant that eros wasn’t on Katsudon’s mind. He wasn’t going to skate nearly as well as the previous two times, Yuri could _tell_. Couldn’t anyone else? Couldn’t Victor tell? It was Victor’s job to fix this, couldn’t he—

The music started, and it was so obvious that something was off. Dark clouds weren’t surrounding Katsudon or excessively weighing him down or anything, but they also weren’t dancing with him. He was just…skating. Kind of normally. Did anyone else see it?

Katsudon finished the combination spin without any lights dancing across the ice. He nailed the triple axel out of the spread eagle without anything there to lift him up. Additional points for difficult entry. The crowd cheered for him. No darkness and no spark. Was this really just…fine?

A year ago Yuri had thought that Katsudon was the most disgusting thing on the ice. That watching the remnants of a demon deal following him around marred every single move the man tried to make. How much better it would have been even with all the failed jumps if Yuri could have just been watching it through a screen because then at least he could see the step sequences without everything that Katsudon had traded away being shoved in his face. Now it…now it looked like Katsudon was skating without a part of himself.

Like he was skating with his mind, not his body.

Quad Salchow, triple toe loop, nailed both. Except the technical improvement couldn’t make up for…couldn’t make up for what only Yuri could see as a loss.

 _Skate with your heart, Katsudon,_ he thought as hard as he could. _Skate with your heart._

Another step sequence, it was…it wasn’t _bad_ , that was the thing. It just wasn’t Katsudon.

Dread gathered in the pit of his stomach.

They were coming up to the last jump, the quad flip, Victor’s jump. And that was the problem, wasn’t it? The quad flip, maximizing on Victor’s signature with the points, it was all about the points, Katsudon had lost before he’d even begun because he was only thinking about the points.

He landed the flip and touched down one hand on the ice, but he got enough rotations in. The jump-shuffling overall meant that the lone quad Salchow had became the combination quad Salchow, triple toe loop, and the quad toe loop triple toe loop was nixed entirely, and then the quad flip was added at the end for extra points. Even with the deduction for the touchdown, it was a higher base technical score than when Katsudon had performed the program before. Didn’t matter, because for the first time Yuri saw a burst of color or rather _lack_ of color gather around the man; Katsudon’s anxiety was back in full force and it was back because he’d messed up Victor’s jump that he never should have had to worry about in the first place.

Katsudon ended the program with the combination spin and he fell to the ice crying.

And just…god, Katsudon deserved better than this. He had worked _so_ hard, he had sacrificed so much, and if there was any fairness in the universe Katsudon shouldn’t have to be crying on the floor at the Grand Prix again. When Katsudon finally pushed himself up, Yuri tried to think _it’s okay, you’re okay, you’re not a failure_ as hard as he could at him, and Katsudon flashed him a small smile, so maybe the message came across.

Katsudon and Victor headed over to the Kiss and Cry, and the score came through: 97.83. Not great, but hey, Yuri had gotten 98.09 in the short program at the Rostelecom Cup and had still come back and won second. It just wasn’t—it wasn’t _fair_ that Katsudon looked so heartbroken.

“You can do it, pig,” Yuri shouted at him, and then Lilia dragged him off back to do a few last warm-ups and _center_ himself or whatever before his own performance. 

Phichit was up next, the only two things that Yuri knew about the Thai skater were that he trained with Katsudon’s old coach, and that he was pretty much one of Katsudon’s only friends. As Yuri caught the end of the performance, he realized one more thing: that Phichit was glowing with unadulterated love for skating completely independent of any of the pressures or thoughts of scoring, and Yuri could respect that. The crowd was clapping along, which probably meant that they could respect that too.

Yuri caught the score—95.73—before Lilia ushered him onto the ice.

It wasn’t fair, Phichit had skated so _well_ , so _openly_ , he deserved better too.

(What was going to be next, Yuri wondered. Sitting despondently in the Kiss and Cry whining to himself that _he_ deserved better?)

Lilia brushed his hair aside as he stood on the ice, cold. There were too many people in the audience for him to pick out where Minako and Mari were sitting, to pick out the banners that Yuuko helped make. That was—that was _agape_ for him. Something that he couldn’t see. He glided to the center of the rink and waited for the music to start. Might as well get this over with.

Sure enough, the music started and he moved…more on instinct than anything else. There were—there were so many things that he could have thought about here. Victor, and how comforting shadowing him over and over and felt when he’d initially learned the choreography. The waterfall. Katsudon. Dedushka. The hours, the days, the weeks that Lilia had poured into him, molding him into the _prima ballerina_ so that he could skate like this without thinking. 

But he—he didn’t, he couldn’t think of any of that, couldn’t _hold on_ to any of that.

He just felt cold.

The first jump was the triple axel and he soared with one arm raised all the way up in the air, graceful like a swan. The cheering—it broke through to him. And his mind flashed to when he’d made Mila film twelve different takes of him landing the triple axel with an arm raised so that he could nit-pick through and find the perfect one to text Yuuko and how much she had gushed in return and how—how—

That was _agape_ , right? Yuuko and the triplets face-timing him to tell him in person just how proud of him they were? Mila grinning and ruffling his hair afterwards?

He leapt into his flying sit-spin, and his posture was perfect and the speed was pretty good too.

 _People shine brightest when they seek to understand what kind of love sustains them,_ Lilia had told him before he’d gone onto the ice. He’d wanted to understand. He’d thought that he could almost understand.

The choreographic sequence finished, and he was off on the quad Salchow, triple toe loop that started off the second half of the program. He did them both with an arm raised again. Was that going to become his…his signature? Yuri Plisetsky, the angel who could fly with his arms raised. The Russian Fairy. Weren’t there supposed to be shadows following him, ones that he jumped over? He couldn’t see them.

His mind just kind of…whited out, and the next thing that he knew, he was in the air again, and both of his arms were raised?

 _Quad toe loop_ , his mind supplied. This was supposed to be his quad toe loop. He’d never done it before with both arms raised. But his body landed like it had, and he just kind of let himself keep going. He had to. What else was he supposed to do?

Skate.

He was supposed to skate.

He didn’t really come back to himself until he was stepping off the ice. Lilia looked…really closed off. Had he done something wrong? Yakov was glowing slightly, though, so it couldn’t have been that wrong. And he’d landed all his jumps, he remembered that much. What did Lilia see that he hadn’t?

He clutched one of the stuffed animals that someone had thrown onto the ice during the Kiss and Cry; it was a huge cat, maybe half the size of his own upper body, and it was this comforting shade of orange-brown and if he slumped, he could almost bury his face in it. His scores were going to come soon. What had he thought before? That it was going to be lower than he’d wished he’d deserved? Because he knew that he’d skated with—with no emotion. Hell, he could barely remember how he’d skated.

He didn’t really catch what they said for the score, although he did feel Yakov stiffen next to him, and he just looked down until—

“He’s surpassed the world record set by Victor Nikiforov.”

_What?!??_

He jolted up, stared at the screen, and for a moment he was pretty sure he’d forgotten how to read because everything seemed like squiggles and he rubbed his eyes and then he finally found the number in the corner, 118.56, Victor’s record had been 116.89, he’d—he’d beaten Victor’s world record by nearly two points. Even if this—even if he didn’t win gold, he’d already made skating history.

A world record at age 15. Was this real?

He hoped Dedushka was watching.

Yakov hoisted him up onto one shoulder and Yuri almost protested because he was so used to Dedushka’s back being fragile, but Yakov was solid, he could hear Yakov saying “That’s my Yuratchka!” and he was blinded by the cameras. Yakov put him down, _finally_ , but kept one arm around Yuri’s shoulder as they were ushered towards interviews. Except Yuri caught sight of two suited people pushing through the crowds, walking towards them purposefully, and a shiver ran down his spine.

“Who are they?” he asked.

“Specialists, privately hired,” Yakov said. “You broke a world record, the ISU needs to check that you didn’t make a deal that’s against the rules.”

“What do they do?” Yuri said. “Blood test? Talk to me or some shit?”

“Talk,” Yakov said. “It shouldn’t take more than ten minutes.”

“I do it alone,” Yuri said.

“Yuri—“

“You’re not my guardian, you have no right to be there,” Yuri spit.

Yakov stared at him. “If this is the start of a scandal—“

“It’s not!” Yuri snapped. “I’m just not a kid, this is _senior division_ , so maybe you can stop chaperoning me everywhere and treating me like I’m twelve!”

That seemed to be enough to make Yakov back off, because he didn’t say anything more until the two people in suits reached them.

“Yuri Plisetsky?” the woman said.

“Yeah.”

“We’re here to—“

“Make sure I won clean, I know,” Yuri said. “Can we do this somewhere private?”

The woman nodded. “Follow me.”

___________________________________________

On the way to the room she had set up, she introduced herself (Natasha Lipatova) and her companion (Carlisle). She was a certified private investigator, and he had the gift to tell if someone was lying. They sat him down behind a table. There was a short speech about his rights, an explanation of devices she could use to check whether or not he was under the influence of a deal, although if he answered his questions truthfully this would be over more quickly and she wouldn’t have to resort to that, there was nothing to be nervous about, et cetera, et cetera.

She didn't have a soul right now, and Yuri was 99% sure that Carlisle was actually just a demon. There was something both too dark and too bright behind his eyes. 

“Get it over with,” Yuri said.

“Do you currently have a deal in effect?” she asked.

“This really is confidential?” Yuri said. “No one—not even my coach—gets to know.”

“Yes. As long you have not cheated, what you say is confidential,” she said.

“Good,” he said. “It stays that way.” A pause. “Yes.”

Carlisle nodded, and Lipatova continued, “What was it for?”

“Nothing against the Grand Prix rules,” Yuri said.

“That’s not enough,” Lipatova said. “We need specifics.”

“It’s a strong one,” Carlisle said. It was the first time Yuri’d heard him speak.

“My grandfather collapsed. I think it was a stroke. I was a bit panicked at the time, so I’m not really sure,” Yuri said. “I made a deal for him to be healthy again.”

Carlisle stared at him, then nodded. 

“This _has_ to stay confidential, he doesn’t know,” Yuri said. “Yakov would tell him, and then he’d—”

Something close to pity flashed across Lipatova’s face. “How long?” she asked.

“It’s open ended,” Yuri said. “He’s protected until I end it.”

Carlisle nodded again.

“Alright,” she said. “I’d like to congratulate you for setting the new world record, Mr. Plisetsky, you are free to go, although you will be asked to demonstrate at the beginning of the Grand Prix Final next year that you are no longer under the influence of a deal.”

“WHAT?!??” 

“It’s common policy, deals that last a year or longer tend to be frowned upon in most public venues. You can apply for an exception if you have certification from a psychologist that you are psychologically sound,” Lipatova said. “But deals that stretch longer than a year can have severe consequences to your mental stability, you could be a danger to yourself or the other skaters.”

 _Katsuki had a deal in effect for five whole years,_ Yuri thought. _While he skated competitively._ But he didn’t say it, because it wasn’t his secret to share.

“I advise that you talk to your coach, and to your grandfather,” Lipatova continued. “You can end your deal in a hospital, where he can get immediate treatment. It’s your choice, of course, but a number of people survive these things. Either way. Congratulations, Mr. Plisetsky, and good luck.”

She and Carlisle left the room, and Yuri tried to stand, but he couldn’t stop shaking.

He had to—had to go back out there. Smile for interviews. Pretend that nothing was wrong. This was a good thing, a world record, something he should be proud of, and the longer he waited here the more that Yakov was going to get on his back for not letting anyone come with.

_End the deal._

If he’d known that breaking a world record would end like this, he would have skated worse. Two points, that was as—as little as not raising his arms during the last jump, and then he wouldn’t be here. Wouldn’t be facing a metaphorical death sentence for himself or a literal one for his grandfather.

Maybe eleven and a half years ago, if he had told his grandfather and they had gone to a hospital, maybe _then_ they would have been able to save him. But Nikolai had been living on nearly twelve years of borrowed time.

No, Yuri had just been given the following ultimatum: kill his grandfather within the next year, or give up skating forever.

The worst part was, he already knew what he would choose.

___________________________________________

He settled down into a seat in the stands behind Victor and Katsudon just as Christophe finished skating. Which meant it was Otabek’s turn next.

“Davai!” he shouted as loudly as he could. Otabek turned and gave him a thumbs up, and Yuri grinned.

Watching Otabek skate was something else. His motions were dramatic, his lines were clean, and he brought his own grace into it. Quad toe, triple toe. Yuri was pretty sure Otabek only had the quad toe loop and the quad Salchow down. Not that it really mattered, he was clearly very good at the jumps he could do. Great speed on the spin. Nothing like—nothing like the ballet that Yuri had been doing, but there was an underlying power and determination to all of Otabek’s moves that Yuri could really admire.

Then Otabek leaped into a triple axel and holy _shit_ , that was ridiculous height and distance.

(In the back of Yuri’s mind came the tiny little voice that said that if anyone managed to figure out how to do a quad axel in the next decade, well, Yuri would place all his bets on it being Otabek.)

Which was good. He was proud of his friend.

There was the quad Salchow, it had really good flow, too. Yuri leaned forward in his seat. This was an interesting program. Different. Really clearly _Otabek._ Really clearly good.

When the scores came in it was 112.38, which on the one hand was fantastic and on the other hand booted Katsudon down to fourth place with JJ left to go. Katsudon was trembling. Victor babbled excitedly about Otabek. _Are you fucking blind_ , Yuri wanted to scream. _You’re his fiancé. He's scared. Do better._

Victor didn’t do better. Victor didn’t do anything. Yuri braced himself for JJ to take to the ice. The entire arena was chanting the stupid fucking Canadian’s name. Had they imported the entire nation of Canada here to Spain to cheer for the douchebag? Was that what happened when you led your own fan meetings?

The music started and _Now I rule the world, and the starry sky spreading above_ , Yuri definitely wanted to puke, those weren’t even good lyrics, he was so busy rolling his eyes that he barely even noticed but—

Something was wrong. There was something different around JJ, something surrounding him, it reached out and dragged him down during the quad toe loop and the quad toe was supposed to be his combination jump, the quad-triple, except he…he just didn’t make the second jump.

Did he change his jump composition? That seemed to be—seemed to be what everyone else was assuming. Except—

Except much like Yuri could sometimes tell when people were glowing when they were happy, JJ _radiated_ anxiety. Yuri could practically see him having a panic attack on the ice, and he knew that Katsudon saw it too, knew in how Katsudon’s shoulders straightened a little and his head cocked and his hands unclenched. JJ made a good distraction, if nothing else.

Yuri was proven right when the triple axel became a single axel, that this all couldn't be a change in jump composition, it was a meltdown happening in slow motion. The ISU requirements for the short program included either a double or triple axel as a component. This was Very Not Good if JJ wasn’t going to be able to meet all of the elements.

JJ threw himself into the step sequence as the chorus came along, and his crowd of fans started singing with him, and it was kind of—kind of pathetic. Yuri could _see_ JJ rallying himself and he hated—hated that this total stranger that he didn’t give a shit about was having such—such _loud_ emotions in front of him, that this entire scene that in theory he shouldn’t care less about was managing to hold his attention at all.

The big quad Lutz at the end of the program turned into a single. Which meant that JJ hadn’t managed to do a combination jump in the program at all. Two missing or failed elements. There was silence across the whole stadium as the program ended. 

JJ left the rink for the Kiss and Cry.

86.71.

The announcer said something about it being the worst score in JJ’s entire history as a senior skater. 

And then his fiancée started to cheer for him.

It spread. All the crying fans—all the stunned, silenced fans—stood and chanted the asshole’s name, and JJ looked even more shook, and Yuri thought bitterly, _this is how you be a good support to your future husband, Victor, I can’t believe that that ugly-ass bitch is a thousand times better than you at the most basic shit like this._

“Stop!” JJ shouted. “It’s…JJ Style!” 

All of the sympathy that Yuri had for JJ vanished, because apparently the dude was back to being a cocky asshole, and Yuri was just…tired. It had been a whirlwind of a day, there were too many ups and downs and he couldn’t deal with any more. Couldn’t deal with people right now. He hopped out of his seat and practically fled from the stands before Victor and Katsudon could say anything to him, grabbed his bag from the locker room, and made a beeline towards the back exit where hopefully, _hopefully_ his fans wouldn’t be waiting for him.

Except Lilia was.

“You did well today,” she said.

He made as noncommittal of a noise as he could in response, hoping that she would leave him alone, but it seemed to have the opposite effect. Lilia put one finger under his chin, and tilted his face up so that he had to meet her eyes.

"You and I are going to have a discussion after the Final is over, no?" she said.

"A-about what?" Yuri said.

"Nothing bad, sweet child," she said. "Just plans for what is to come. You have a bright future, Yuri Plisetsky. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise."

 _You have a bright future._ Great. One more person that he would—that he would disappoint that he didn’t want to think about. He wasn't sure who he was going to miss more, Yakov or Lilia.

"Do you have dinner plans with the other skaters?" she asked.

Yuri shook his head. "I—I don't think anyone has plans. I was just going to order room service. I'm tired." _Don't take me out,_ he prayed.

"Hmph," she said. Then: "Would you mind if I joined you?"

Yuri was so surprised that he stammered yes.

And so he found himself sitting criss-cross on his bed with Lilia sitting criss-cross next to him, picking through a whole assortment of foods that they'd ordered, and it was so—frighteningly normal. They chatted about Victor and Katsudon's engagement. They chatted about what to expect from the free skates. They chatted about the history of Barcelona. "Güell commissioned Gaudí to build a lot of the architecture here,” Yuri told her. “Gaudí said Güell was maybe the only other person who liked his designs, and Güell that he didn’t like Gaudí’s designs, he respected them.”

“I’m surprised you know that,” Lilia said.

“I visited the Park Güell yesterday,” he said. Thank god Otabek was such a nerd.

“I especially like the mosaics there,” Lilia said.

Yuri grinned. “Me too. They were my favorite.”

They didn’t get dessert, because sugar could keep him up, and Lilia boxed all the extra food nicely for him and put it in the mini-fridge, just as carefully as she always packaged leftovers in her own home. 

"Go to sleep," she told him as she left, and something pushed at the edges of his mind, a warm drowsiness, and there was nothing he could do but obey.

___________________________________________

Katsudon and Victor came to the public practice the next morning, and they both looked completely and utterly heartbroken.

What the _fuck_ was everyone's problem? Could the world not go a single day without absolutely everyone having a complete meltdown? Yuri wasn't sure what the fuck Victor did, hell, he wasn't sure what the fuck _Katsudon_ did, but—

But it was none of his business. He was going to be leaving skating soon anyways. 

He'd probably have to—he'd probably have to fake a career-ending injury for Victor and Yakov and Katsudon would leave him alone. Hell, fake wouldn't work, he'd actually have to sustain one.

He shivered.

The ladies singles were competing before the men, so he, Yakov, and Lilia all went to watch Mila win silver. Mila's new friend Sara won bronze. He took a picture of the both of them for Mila's Instagram. "And I'll return the favor for you!" Mila told him.

And then it was time for men's singles.

JJ was skating first and Yuri could not give less of a fuck how he did, so he stayed in the back and listened to his music over and over and let Lilia fuss over his hair. Phichit was next, and Yuri only noticed his program from the screens so to notice when it was over.

"I _am_ going to watch Katsudon live, don't think that you or anyone else can stop me," he told Lilia, who raised a single eyebrow at him.

Still, he made it to the rink before Katsudon even skated to the center for his starting pose. Instead, Katsudon and Victor were still hugging, and it looked like both of them were crying.

They were happier, though. They might both be crying, but they were also glowing, like they were a part of something a little bit bigger than themselves. Then Katsudon skated to the center of the rink, and _'Yuri on Ice'_ began to play.

Katsudon glowed even brighter. He didn’t so much skate as he floated across the rink, that was how—how graceful his movements were. How effortless. It almost looked like his eyes were closed, like he didn’t need anything to orient him, because he was…centered. Calm. Ready.

Yuri’s breathing evened out.

Quad toe, double toe. 

The music began to rise and Katsudon’s emotions did too, a blinding, ever-reaching love that Yuri knew that Katsudon specifically directed at Victor, the sort of love between them that was as natural as breathing the same air as the other. Except it shifted, colored itself a slightly different shade, reached out further, and with love tinted with _gratitude_ —

Katsudon jumped a clean quad Salchow.

“Yes,” Yuri whispered. And then pretended there weren’t tears in his eyes.

The camel spin was next. Then Katsudon went faster as the music went faster, and then he executed a perfect—a perfect triple flip. Instead of the triple loop that he usually did there.

He was altering his program composition. 

_Altering it so it would be more like something of Victor’s. Something that would give Victor a run for his money._

Piano notes descended rapidly and then there was a single chord ringing out clear and Katsudon glided forward, arms open.

And the glow, it was something more than just—more than just love for Victor, or for Mari and Minako, or all the people watching at Katsudon’s home, or Phichit, or even Yuri, or even...even the ice. 

It was something more.

It was something deeper.

Katsudon had found his love for himself.

The triple axel.

Katsudon shone out with—with pride, with determination, with a fierce love for everything around him— _we call everything on the ice love,_ Yuri was pretty sure Victor had said to him once, and he was pretty sure it had never been more true than whatever he was witnessing now. Katsudon soared through the air, and it wasn’t a triple flip, it was a quad toe loop. Four quads in a program. Katsudon was going to jump four quads in his program.

Yuri was so _proud_ of him.

Triple axel, single loop, triple Salchow. Then into a brief choreographic sequence. 

Victor had once said that watching Katsudon skate was like watching Katsudon make music with his body. And it—god, it was true, but it was also—it was also watching him make music with his heart. _I don’t want this to end,_ Yuri thought, and he knew that Katsudon was thinking the same thing.

Triple lutz, triple toe loop.

The love, it—it surrounded Katsudon, it danced with him just as much as he’d once danced with his own anxiety back at Rostelecom Cup, he was dancing with all of the love in his heart now, and Yuri could feel it spreading, he could see the whole audience starting to glow too, the soft light illuminating Katsudon’s step sequence.

Then it was—it was the last jump, the quadruple flip, _Victor’s_ jump, and Yuri could see the light surrounding Katsudon, picking him up, guiding him through the air, a thousand little points scattered across his body like his skin was covered in stars, or maybe it was just—maybe it was just the sequins sewn to his costume, or maybe it was the tears in Yuri’s eyes.

Katsudon finished with his combination spin, and came to a rest with one arm reaching out towards Victor.

"Come," Lilia said. "You need to prepare for your own performance."

 _Going back there means it's over,_ Yuri thought. _I don't want to go._.

But he let himself be led away. Let Lilia finish fixing up his hair, played _Allegro Appassionato_ until he couldn't hear anything else, and pretended that none of it could get to him.

He still had a gold medal to win, after all.

___________________________________________

Yakov and Lilia were walking him over to the rink for his own turn to perform when Victor ran into them. As Yuri was still listening to _Allegro Appassionato_ , he wasn’t quite sure what words were exchanged, although he was pretty sure Victor said something along the lines of he wanted to talk to Yakov, Yakov shouted back that it was almost Yuri’s turn, and then Victor said he was going to start skating again. Yuri got the music to stop with trembling fingers just in time to hear—

“Yeah! For now, I’ll time my return to the Russian Nationals!”

Yuri ripped his earbuds out. “Does that mean that Katsudon’s retiring?”

Victor smiled. “That’s his decision. He said he’d decide after the Grand Prix Final was over.”

Suddenly it all made sense, why Victor and Katsudon had looked so heartbroken at the public practice, why Katsudon had skated like it was his last time on the ice. Because it very well might have been his last time on the ice. And Yuri—Yuri _knew_ , Yuri felt it, _I don't want to go, going back there means it’s over_ , that hadn’t just been him thinking it, it was Katsudon too.

Victor pulled Yuri into a hug, and Yuri felt himself relax into the physical affection, his stupid traitor heart missing when Victor used to do this all the time; except now he’d gotten what he wanted, Victor was coming back, except it was _nothing_ that he wanted, not if Katsudon leaving was the price.

“Go out there and win the gold, Yuratchka,” Victor whispered. “No one else can reach him now. But he’ll be watching _you_. You’re the only one who can do this. If you win gold, he’ll stay.”

Then Victor let him go and Yakov and Lilia pushed him even faster towards the ice because Otabek was finishing up and then it was going to be his turn to skate, his last chance to skate, the one final performance that Katsudon's future rested on.

“Davai!” people were shouting at him. He wasn’t quite sure who. He didn’t care. He didn’t have time to care.

 _Yakov, Lilia, Dedushka,_ he thought as he skated to the center of the ice. _Yuuko and the rest. And Yuuri Katsuki. Watch this closely._

The music started, and he threw himself into it like a dying man.

Choreography into a step sequence into a quad Salchow. He could do it. He _did_ do it just fine. The movements were easy for him. The emotions—he never really did have a chance to ask Lilia what _Allegro Appassionato_ was about, other than it being fast and meant to show off his dance background and loosely based on the whole Firebird thing. _Agape_ was about unconditional love. He wasn’t—wasn’t quite sure what he was supposed to be feeling here. Passion, maybe?

Well, he sure as fuck was pissed.

He felt disconnected and infuriated all at once, and he let it seep into his movements, seep into the words that his body was spelling out. Fuck the world, for being this unfair. Fuck Victor for leaving. Fuck Katsudon for leaving. 

Spiral into a triple axel. He threw one of his arms up and held it there, let his body tighten as he whirled through the air, first up and then down like he was trying to climb a stairway that was collapsing underneath him and he landed as clean as he ever had. Difficult entry and one arm raised, that should be at least two additional points for grade of execution. 

Then it was another—another step sequence, and he held onto his anger, because he didn’t have anything else. What the fuck was Katsudon doing, retiring once he won his first gold? Did he not care anymore now that he’d gotten a score higher than Victor’s? That was _bullshit._ If that was all this—all this meant to the two of them, then neither of them _deserved_ gold.

He'd never been more thankful for how fast the step sequence was, how he could carve it all out on the ice. He didn't know whether or not he was hiking or tanking his presentation scores, but now that this had all come over him, he couldn't staunch the flow. How fitting, that Katsudon's last time on the ice had been all about love and now his was all about anger and hate.

The first of the six second half jumps was a triple Lutz. He’d always—he’d always wanted to learn it as a quad, to add it to his repertoire, but that wasn’t going to happen now, was it? The ice was being _taken away_ from him but at least he had the guts to fucking go down fighting.

Triple flip, then off for the step sequence at the unforgiving pace again. _Allegro Appassionato_ hadn’t stopped being hellishly tiring just because he was mad. Not that he cared. He would give until he had nothing left to give, that was what he always did, that had been the promise from the beginning, _if selling my soul is what it takes to win_ —

And then he fell, worse than he had fallen in ages. 

That was supposed to have been a quad toe loop, not him tumbling across the ice. It was going to—going to bruise. It was going to cost him the difference, maybe, between gold and silver, between Katsudon staying and Katsudon leaving.

 _What does it matter if Katsudon leaves,_ whispered a tiny voice in the back of his mind. _It’s not like you’ll be there for it._

He was up without missing a single beat in the music, back into the routine like nothing had happened, like it was still possible to salvage this. After all, raising his arms had been the difference between a good score and the world record that had ruined everything. He threw himself into the quad Salchow triple toe loop with both arms raised. Maybe it could be the difference between Katsudon staying or going too.

 _Are you watching, Katsudon?_ he wondered. _Somebody's going to take your record one day. In another world it might even have been me. If you give up now, you're going to regret it._

He didn’t think about the what-could-have-beens. He didn’t think about him and Victor and Katsudon walking Makkachin in the mornings through the streets of St. Petersburg like they did at Hasetsu, he didn’t think about them all going to the rink together, about Yakov yelling and Victor laughing it off and how it still felt empty without that laughter there every day. He didn’t think about stupid movie nights except how there would be one more person cuddled up on Victor’s couch. He didn’t think about Katsudon cooking all the best dishes that both Yuri and Victor had fallen in love with in Japan, like bringing a bit of home with them.

He _didn’t think about it_ , because he couldn’t have it, he was never going to have it, he wasn’t allowed to have it, all that he had left were these precious few seconds on the ice that maybe, _maybe_ he could use to convince Katsudon to stay.

It was supposed to be a triple loop, double toe loop next, but fuck that, he threw himself harder, spun faster, landed the quad toe loop into a double toe loop instead, because if Katsudon was going to land four quads then _so was he._

 _If you retire right now,_ he thought, _I’m going to make you regret it for the rest of your life._

Triple axel, single loop, triple Salchow. He landed them. Was it enough?

There was only one more element, the final element, the combination spin. Yuri was good at spins. He’d been known as a junior for them.

 _Junior level spins aren’t enough to make you win,_ his mind whispered, and he pointedly tried to ignore it, curled in tighter on himself before pushing back up as gracefully as he could manage, exiting the spin and taking one, two, three steps into his ending pose.

It was over.

It was finally over, for better or for worse, this had been his last chance, he had no idea whether he blew it or not, no idea what his score was going to look like, all he could think of was falling across the ice, of how he had skated with _spite_ instead of beauty.

He fell to his knees, sobbing, buried his face in his hands and hoped that no one was looking or if they were they’d write if off to either pressure or pride in what he’d just done or anything other than the crushing failure that overwhelmed him. Victor was wrong. Victor had been wrong from the start. Victor was a dirty, dirty liar who'd say anything to keep Katsudon around.

It didn’t matter whether or not he’d won gold.

When had gold ever been enough to make someone stay?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it does not state anywhere what Victor’s previous world records were, just that his superscore was 335.76. However, the short program score had to be more than 113.56 because JJ never broke his record, and less than 118.56, because Yuri _did._ We can actually further narrow it down because to “more than 114.18” because 335.76 would be the sum of his free skate and his short program records, and his free skate needs to be less than 221.58 for Yuuri to have broken said record. On the other end of things, Victor needs a free skate program between 217.20 and 221.58 points such that Yuri could break his short program record.
> 
> I picked 116.89 for the short program kind of arbitrarily, which leaves 218.87 for his free skate. Both within the acceptable windows. Math is fun.
> 
> I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


	9. final, pt ii

When all was said and done, he won by 0.12 points.

He was trembling as he stood there on the podium, Katsudon on one side and JJ on the other. The whole world was watching. He was Yuri Plisetsky, fifteen years old, Russia's prodigy, and he'd won gold in the Grand Prix Final in his senior debut.

It couldn't have mattered less to him.

He smiled for the cameras, let JJ throw an arm around his shoulder as they stepped down for more photos. He hurried as quickly as he could back to Yakov and Lilia, answered the questions that reporters threw at him like he cared—yes, he was proud of winning, yes, he hoped to go to Worlds, no, he didn't know what he was going to do next season, no, he had not spoken to Victor Nikiforov about choreography for next season, no, he really didn't have other plans to do anything but go back to St Petersburg and practice until his next competition, no, he had no idea what the future was going to hold, _he just wanted to keep skating._

It was a lie and it wasn’t at the same time. Lilia was looking at him with one eyebrow raised, even Yakov looked a little bit skeptical as they waved off the rest of the reporters. One of them must have asked him if he was okay, and he spit back something along the lines of it didn’t really feel like winning when he’d scored more than twenty points worse on the free skate than Katsuki had, and hoped that the combination of his highly competitive nature and his natural assholery would cover for the fact that he was acting weird.

He caught sight of Victor and Katsudon talking by the edge of the rink, and realized that this might be his last chance to—to say anything to either of them.

The first thing he had ever said to Katsudon was that he should retire. That there shouldn’t be two Yuris in the same bracket. Well, there were about to be _no_ Yuris in the bracket and wasn’t it such a beautiful, terrible irony that Yuri was going to storm over and yell at the idiot that he shouldn’t retire.

That was—that was all he was going to do. Tell Katsudon not to retire and then go.

He managed to successfully storm over to where Victor and Katsudon were. “You can’t retire,” he said, not even caring what he was interrupting. “You can’t, because _I’m_ retiring and there needs to be—and you need to win, you can’t give up yet.”

And that. Wait. Fuck. That was more than he thought he was going to say.

Victor’s expression snapped all from whatever lovey-dovey look he’d been giving Katsudon to a sharp concern. “You—“

“If we’re going to talk about this, we should talk in private,” Katsudon said.

“There’s nothing to talk about,” Yuri said. “You’re not allowed to retire. The end.”

“Yurio—“

“No!”

“I’m not retiring,” Katsudon said quietly. “And Victor is coming back.”

“Oh,” Yuri said. “Good. I…” The burst of energy that had propelled him over was fading, and he almost felt like he was going to faint. 

“Yura—” Victor tried again, and Yuri wobbled and nearly fell over, only Katsudon placed his arm around his shoulders before Yuri could properly lose his balance. Katsudon shook his head, and Victor bit his lip.

“Let’s get you somewhere you can lie down,” Katsudon said. “Victor, keep Yakov occupied. I’m taking him to our room.”

The last thing he saw before Katsudon escorted him from the rink was Victor standing there, looking so lost and confused that Yuri wanted to burst out crying. He and Katsudon had probably been having a _moment_ but nooooo, Yuri just _had_ to stomp through and ruin everything and—

“I’m glad that you came to us,” Katsudon said. “It means a lot that you feel like you can trust us with something like this.”

“Shut up,” Yuri growled. “I’m not trusting you with anything.” 

Katsudon pressed the button for the elevator. How were they at the hotel already?

“Let’s just get you somewhere you can lie down,” he said.

“You already said that.”

“When’s the last time you ate? Or slept?” Katsudon asked.

“Fuck you, it’s been normal,” Yuri said. “I’m not stupid enough to break my diet or throw my sleep schedule right before a competition.” Then he realized that— “Not that…not that I meant…sorry.”

“You must really be feeling under the weather if you’re apologizing to me,” Katsudon said.

“What are we even doing here, Yakov is going to be livid,” Yuri said. “They’re going to want us for more interviews.”

“You looked like you were about to fall down,” Katsudon said.

“Well I’m not anymore,” Yuri said.

“Please.”

Yuri stayed silent.

He let Katsudon lead him all the way to his room, sit him up on his bed, and wrap a blanket around him. Katsudon said something about making tea, and he nodded mutely. 

About a minute after Katsudon had pressed a hot cup into Yuri’s hands and he’d taken to staring at it instead of drinking it, there was a knock on the door, then Victor was in the room. Yuri tried to feel annoyed, but he was mostly grateful under all of the crushing _numbness_ ; if he had to explain this, he didn’t want to explain this more than once.

“What’s going on?” Victor demanded, and any other day Yuri would have yelled at him, only the man still looked like he was about to cry. “I told Yakov that you were feeling sick, but I don’t know if that’s going to hold him for long. Yura, what’s wrong, are you okay?”

Yuri stared resolutely at his tea. “The woman who checked me when I beat the world record,” he told it. “She said I had to call the deal off before the next Grand Prix Final or I wasn’t allowed to skate.” There was a sharp gasp from Katsudon. Good, at least one person understood.

“What deal?” Victor said, and Yuri didn’t want to imagine the stormy look in his eyes, the anger on his face. Didn’t want to think about what Victor must think of him now.

“Yuri, do you want me to—“ Katsudon started to offer, but Yuri shook his head. He was strong enough to still do this himself, at least. “The one that’s keeping my grandfather alive,” he choked out, and then he properly dissolved into tears, Katsudon leaping to the rescue and snatching the tea from his hands before he could spill it everywhere.

There was a hand on his shoulder. “Oh, Yura,” Victor said, and then he pulled Yuri into his arms. Yuri sobbed into him, limp as a ragdoll.

“You can’t tell Yakov because he’ll tell Dedushka and then I’d have to—“

“Shh, shh,” Victor said. “We’re not going to tell anyone without your permission.” Victor looked at Katsudon over his shoulder. “How long? How long have you known?”

“I told Yuuri after the Rostelecom Cup,” Yuri said, muffled. “He was the only person I knew who—who might know how—who survived it for years.”

Victor pulled him in tighter. “We can take Nikolai to a hospital, we can make sure—“

“I said no!” Yuri shrieked. 

“Yuri, if this gets worse, and you cut yourself off from help, you could get sick and die,” Katsudon said, sitting down next to them. “And then the deal will be off.”

“I know that!” Yuri said.

“Have you considered that your grandfather might be okay?” Katsudon continued. “When a skater asks for their ankle to be fixed, it doesn’t go back to being sprained when their time is up. It’s fixed. He might be alright, and then it would break his heart if you weren’t alright too.”

“I—I know that,” Yuri said. “But I—I can’t. I just—I can’t. Risk that. He wouldn’t. I can’t.”

“Okay,” Katsudon said. “We’ll protect you for as long as you need, okay? No one will force you to do anything.”

“Okay,” Yuri said, and he pushed Victor away and climbed into Katsudon’s lap because at least Katsudon _understood_. Katsudon welcomed him with open arms and started rubbing small circles into his back.

“Yura, this is—“ Victor said. “This is serious. You’ve had a deal in effect for at least a month. That can have really serious consequences.” 

Yuri tried to laugh, but it came out more as a hiccup. 

“And I know—you’ve skated without ever making one before, so this is new, and you don’t know what’s going to happen,” Victor continued. “But a whole year is—“

“I’ve skated without making one before because you can’t have two deals going at the same time,” Yuri said.

Yuri could _feel_ Victor and Katsudon both freeze. Katsudon recovered first. Probably wasn’t too surprising; _he_ could see how dark the shadows around Yuri were.

“You started skating with Yakov when you were ten,” Victor said slowly. “That would be nearly— _five and a half years._ ”

Yuri stayed silent.

“Yura—“ Victor, said, but Katsudon cut him off. “Victor, give him space.” Yuri decided that Katsudon’s lap had indeed been the correct place to hide for this entire conversation.

He could feel the bed dip as Victor scooted closer, and put a hand on his shoulder. “You’re not alone anymore,” Victor said. “You’ve been bearing this silently for years, but you’re not alone anymore. You’re so strong, Yura, but you don’t have to do this alone.” Yuri didn’t even try to answer him. He probably meant well, but—Katsudon understood. Victor _couldn’t._

“Victor, could you get him a glass of water?” Katsudon asked. By some miracle, Victor obeyed.

“I made the deal when I was four,” Yuri confessed into Katsudon’s shoulder the moment Victor was gone. “My mother was working, Dedushka was watching me and he fell over and he wasn’t moving so I made the deal.”

“Oh, Yuri.” At least there wasn’t any pity in Katsudon’s voice, only a grave understanding.

“I’ve lived three quarters of my life without a soul,” Yuri said. “Why should I stop now?”

There were footsteps, then Victor was back on their side of the room with the water, and Yuri stopped speaking. Yuri didn’t even want to _think_ about trying to explain himself to anyone other than Katsudon. Victor handed the glass of water to Katsudon, and Katsudon nudged him. “You skated very hard, and you’ve been crying. If you get dehydrated, you’ll have a headache.”

Yuri accepted the glass and drank it as quickly as he could, then went back to hiding his face in Katsudon’s shoulder.

“Yuuri…” There was pounding at the door, and Victor glanced down at his phone guiltily. “That’s… probably Yakov, I have three missed calls already.”

“Make him go away,” Yuri said.

Victor, being the _completely useless_ dimwit that he was, opened the door to try to tell that to Yakov’s face, but Yakov stormed in instead. “Yuri, what are you _doing_ , you had me worried sick, if you’re—“

Yuri assumed that he went silent because he caught sight of Yuri still buried in Katsudon’s arms, and if anything was telling of the severity of the situation, it would be this tableau.

“What happened to him,” Yakov growled. Yuri hoped that it was Victor who was on the other end of his death-glare, and not Katsudon. Katsudon deserved better than that.

“The stress has been getting to him,” Katsudon said quietly. “I know some techniques for panic attacks. I’m sorry for worrying you, sir, but we wanted to get him out of public.”

“My _Yura_ doesn’t have panic attacks!” Yakov said. Victor gesticulated wildly towards the two Yuris on the bed, and Yakov threw his arms in the air.

This was a nightmare, and Yuri just wanted it to end.

Only…

If Yakov went away, Yuri was going to have to do this all over again. In an hour, in a day, it didn’t matter.

“Tell him,” he said into Katsudon’s shoulder. He wasn’t sure if he was asking Katsudon to explain that he was retiring, or what was really going on. Katsudon could choose, then it wouldn’t be Yuri’s fault whatever followed. 

“Yuri might need to take a short break from skating,” Katsudon said carefully. “While he works some things out.”

“Yura is _my_ skater, he’s not—“

“I broke your rules,” Yuri said before Yakov could yell at Katsudon anymore because Katsudon _did not deserve this._

“Yuri—“ Katsudon said, and maybe he knew something about not speaking with no filter when you’re emotionally compromised but Yuri didn’t _care_ because he was fluctuating between panic and shame and numbness and the deepest pit of hatred he could imagine and he knew that there was one thing he could say and then Yakov would never bother him again.

“I broke the only rule that ever mattered. I sold my soul. Before senior division.”

“You _what_?!??”

Yuri turned to look at him. “You heard me.”

Yakov’s face went the worst shade of purple, and the thought crossed Yuri’s mind that he might have to sell his soul again if his coach went and had a heart attack here because of him.

Victor jumped between the two of them. “No, no no! It’s not like that! It’s not—“

“No! Someone is going to tell me exactly what is going on, or _you_ —“ he whipped a finger towards Yuri “—are never setting foot on my rink again!”

The feeling like the floor had disappeared beneath him and he was in free-fall disappeared, replaced by the numbness again. “Well. That was the plan.”

Victor looked devastated. “No, Yakov, you don’t understand, _Yuri_ , don’t—“

“I don’t think this is the time to be having this discussion,” Katsudon said quietly, only his voice cut through everything else in the room.

Both men shut up, and turned towards him. Katsudon shrugged. “Having this conversation when emotions are so high is only going to lead to people saying things that they don’t mean. Or that they regret, when they have time to think things over.”

“…Lilia was looking for you, to congratulate you properly,” Yakov said. “You’ve made us all very proud. Your grandfather called. He was watching.”

_He was watching._

Yuri made a noncommittal noise. There was a pause, as if Yakov was trying to think of something else to say, but the silence never filled. He just left. Which was...which was okay. Yuri wanted to be alone. Yuri didn't want to deal with anyone except maybe Katsudon, he didn't want to think about how it was one thing to say that he wanted to quit skating so that his grandfather would be okay and another to hear straight from his coach that he was never going back to the place that he'd spent pretty much every day of his life since he was ten.

“Victor…could we have the room?” Katsudon asked.

“Of…of course,” Victor stammered, and then _Victor left._

Katsudon was _magic._

“May I?” Katsudon asked, and Yuri nodded, not really knowing what he was agreeing to, and then suddenly Katsudon’s hands were in his hair and the pins were carefully being taken out and Katsudon was brushing it out carefully with his fingers, then carefully weaving it in and out of braids.

That started a whole new round of tears.

“Katsudon, what do I _do_?” 

“What do you _want_ to do?” Katsudon asked.

Yuri wiped his eyes. “I want to keep skating. But I want my grandfather to be alright.”

“Can I say something?” Katsudon said. “It might not be my place, but…”

“Go ahead,” Yuri said.

“When you made the deal to save him, he was your only family,” Katsudon said. “You had your mother too, but there’s…there’s family and there’s _family._ And he was your only _family._ ” Katsudon swallowed. “But he’s not your only family anymore. You have Mila, and Yakov and Lilia. You have Victor, you have me. We’re all here. No one lives forever. You can’t force anyone to live forever, even though it can be really, really hard to let go. But if you let go, there will be people to catch you. It’s safe for you to let go now. And I know it can be terrifying to believe that it’s safe to let go when you can’t see it yourself. But we’re here.” He paused. “I’m moving to Russia. So I’ll be there.”

“You’d move to Russia for me?”

Katsudon shrugged. “I mean. Not just for you. You’re a big reason. I think I decided after Rostelecom Cup. There’s also…I want to keep skating. But I don’t want to keep Victor from skating. The two of us could try to make do in Japan, but Victor’s family is in Russia. His rink is there. And we’re…apparently engaged? I’m pretty sure Victor was serious about us being engaged.”

“WHAT?!?? You don’t _know_ if you’re engaged?!? But you bought him a ring and everything!“

“I bought the rings as good luck charms,” Katsudon said. “I…I guess I could have been more specific when…”

“And then Victor just announced to everyone that you were engaged?!??”

Katsudon was bright red. “I mean, I…I don’t mind, I _want_ to be engaged to him, and I did buy him a ring.”

“I can’t believe it! I yelled at him about not fucking stuff up for you and everything!”

“You yelled at him for me?” Katsudon asked. 

“Yeah,” Yuri said. “Victor can be stupid a lot. I wanted him to know that he’d have someone to answer to if he broke your heart or some shit.”

Katsudon smiled, and the air around him glowed slightly. “Thank you.”

“Whatever.”

“Either way, I’m moving to Russia,” Katsudon said. “As soon as possible. I’m certainly staying for next season. Maybe indefinitely. It’s starting to feel like I have family there too. So I’ll be there for you, whatever you choose.”

“Okay,” Yuri said. “I think I…I think I maybe want to talk to Yakov?”

___________________________________________

Katsudon texted Victor, because apparently he could magically sense that Yuri did not want him to leave for a single minute, not even to poke his head out into the hallway and tell Victor to call Yakov. Victor kept waiting outside, because apparently Katsudon could also tell that dealing with _both_ Victor and Yakov would have been overwhelming. 

It took Yakov all of two minutes to get to their room, which made Yuri think that maybe he had been waiting for this call. The man hovered somewhat awkwardly once inside, as if he couldn’t decide if he should stand or sit.

“I want to keep skating,” Yuri said. Yakov opened his mouth, but Yuri cut him off, because he didn’t want a lecture, he wanted to get this out. “Katsudon asked me what I wanted to do, and I want to keep skating. Even though I don’t want to…”

He took a deep breath. “I was four years old and Dedushka collapsed and he wasn’t moving and I made a deal that he would stay alive and well for as long as the demon held my soul. But the woman who checked me for the world record said that my deal had to be voided by the next Grand Prix Final or I wouldn’t be psychologically sound to compete. That’s why I was going to retire. But Katsudon said I shouldn’t.”

Yakov was silent. Yakov, who _always_ had something to say, was just standing there silently.

“Please don’t look at me different,” Yuri said, and that was all he could get out, because if he kept talking he was going to start crying _again_.

“Yurachka,” Yakov said, and his voice was gruff, like he was trying not to cry too. “You are _always_ welcome on my rink.”

“Okay,” Yuri said.

The awkward silence started to fill the room again.

“Victor and I are moving back to Russia,” Katsudon said. “So we’ll be there to help too.”

“Guess I’m letting that idiot back on my rink after all,” Yakov grumbled. “You, Katsuki, are always welcome.”

“Could we ask you a big favor?” Katsudon said.

“What?”

“Please don’t tell Yuri’s grandfather before Yuri has the chance to,” Katsudon said. “Or at least the chance to decide how he wants him to find out.”

Yakov sighed. “Alright. I can do that. How many other people know?”

“Right now, just you, me, and Victor,” Katsudon said. “Yuri might want more of his rinkmates to know. I know that Mila’s been looking out for him for the past few months, making sure that he eats. But it’s absolutely vital this is kept from the press.”

“Agreed,” Yakov says.

“Lilia should know too,” Yuri said. 

Yakov made a noise that could have indicated agreement but mostly sounded like a horse snorting. "Do you want me to take care of that, or...?"

“I think she’d be very upset to hear from anyone else but me,” Yuri said. “But I also…”

“It’s been overwhelming,” Katsudon said. “There are a lot of people right now who know, and who are crowding in. Yuri spent over a decade with no one knowing. This has been a lot, not just Victor, but you. And it’s…it’s exhausting to have this conversation over and over again. So maybe tomorrow? Let everyone know that we’re alright. And then Yuri can talk to them in his own time.”

Katsudon was _magic_.

“God,” Yakov said. “I don't know what we're going to tell the FFKK."

Yuri suddenly couldn’t breathe, because oh _god_ , he hadn’t even thought about money in the last two days, he’d been counting on the even bigger cash prize at Worlds to cover the expenses for the season outside of his grant, but between travel fees and coaching fees for both Yakov and Lilia and—

“Yuratchka, listen, you do not need to worry about _any_ of that,” Yakov said. “I will sponsor you myself if you want to continue skating. If you need to take the rest of the season off—"

"We can talk about this sort of thing later," Katsudon said. "It's been an exhausting day. Worlds is a long time from now."

Yakov sighed. “Get some rest, Yura,” he said. “I’ll take care of everything else.” He gave them both one more look, and then he left the room.

Yuri leaned his head on Katsudon's shoulder.

"I've got you," Katsudon said, and for once, Yuri believed him.

___________________________________________

Yuri must have drifted off, because when he came back to full awareness the light in the room had shifted, what little was being let in by the window fell in a different angle across the floor and wall. Katsudon hadn’t moved, despite the fact that his legs _must_ have been falling asleep.

Katsudon was an angel and Yuri would murder anyone who said otherwise.

“You’re awake?” Katsudon said softly. 

He nodded. 

“Ready to face the world a bit more?” Katsudon asked.

He shrugged, and climbed out of Katsudon’s lap because the man’s legs must _really_ have been falling asleep, Yuri wasn't exactly light. Katsudon slung his arms around Yuri’s shoulders still, though, and Yuri was content to sit like that, next to him, and just not have to move.

“I should probably take a shower before we talk about food plans,” Katsudon said. “That and…” He glanced at his phone pointedly.

“Victor wants to be let back into his room?” Yuri said.

“Victor wants to be let back into his room,” Katsudon confirmed.

Yuri sighed. “If he cries all over me I’m going to be really pissed.”

“I think he’s going to cry all over you,” Katsudon said. “There’s something about people that he cares about trying to even hint at him that they’re no longer going to be competitively skating that gets him really upset.”

“Why did you say you were going to quit?” Yuri said. “After…after everything? Why did you tell him you were going to retire?”

“I could see how heartbroken it was making him,” Katsudon said. “Watching everyone else skate but not being able to skate himself.”

Yuri laughed. “I could have told you that one from the beginning.”

“I think you did,” Katsudon said.

“I definitely did,” Yuri said. “But he was really happy too, this season. He’s been happier than I’ve ever seen him. He needs skating to live, but he needs other things, too.” 

“Well,” Katsudon said. “It’s your turn to be cried over, because you clearly didn’t consider that you’d be on that list of other things too.”

“Traitor,” Yuri deadpanned. “It’s Victor’s fault, he never texted.”

“I’m pretty sure he forgot to change his phone plan,” Katsudon said.

Of _course._

“Alright, you can let Victor back in the room,” Yuri said. “I’ve dealt with a crying Georgi, it can’t be too much worse.”

Katsudon looked at him a little bit funny, and he realized that Katsudon knew absolutely nothing about his rinkmates and all of the drama that he was about to get himself into. Between Mila and her not-quite-girlfriend-yet, and Georgi had taken to one of the new online dating sites to meet people, not to mention the junior skaters being the junior skaters…

“He had a very heartfelt program during Cup of China,” Katsudon said. 

Right. They were talking about Georgi.

“He’s even more dramatic in person,” Yuri said. “Also, his makeup is always that bad. We like to tease him a lot. He’s always going on about true love. But he’s pretty nice under all that. You’ll get to meet him properly soon.”

“Oh,” Katsudon said, looking down.

“It’s okay, everyone will like you,” Yuri said. “They’re not all as prissy as me.”

That brought a smile to Katsudon’s face. 

“Let Victor in, let’s get this over with,” Yuri said.

“Alright,” Katsudon said. He sent a quick text, then pushed himself off the bed. “Good luck.”

Despite what Katsudon had said about Victor wanting to come in, it took a full minute, enough for Yuri to hear the shower start up and hug his own knees to his chest, before the door inched open. Victor—Victor looked _horrible._ Somehow in the—hour? hour and a half?—that Katsudon had been acting as a chair and pillow, Victor had managed to sport bags under his eyes that looked like the results of three days of not sleeping. His hair was limp. _Limp._ Yuri had _never_ seen Victor with limp hair.

"You look terrible," Yuri said.

Victor just made a _noise._

Yuri sighed, and reached out as if to invite a hug. As he'd told Katsudon, might as well get it over with.

Victor immediately lurched forward and threw himself in Yuri's arms and clutched him maybe a little bit too tight and started sobbing into Yuri's shoulder, which in Yuri's opinion was a little but unfair, nothing had happened to _Victor_ , but for all that Victor liked to say that skaters' hearts were made of glass, his heart was by far the most easy Yuri had ever known to shatter.

"I'm fine," Yuri grumbled. 

"Were you even going to tell us?" Victor said.

Yuri could have lied, but also, he was very tired. "No."

"Then what would you have—"

"Moved to Moscow and lived with Dedushka?" Yuri said. "I don't know. Maybe go to secondary school with the time we had left?"

Victor squeezed him even tighter.

"Can't. Breathe!"

Victor let him go a bit, although he was still clinging like a barnacle. Then, of course, he had to go and ask the worst question, the one that Yuri didn't even want to think about answering:

"Would it have helped if I stayed?"

"I don't know," Yuri said. "Probably not. You're useless at this kind of stuff." And if he broke Victor's record he'd still be in the same position. "Maybe if I didn't break your record. But I haven't been sleeping that much and Mila makes sure I eat and there have been times when—" He squeaked, cut off. "Can'tbreathe!"

Victor reluctantly loosened his grip again.

"You're not allowed to live alone," Victor said. "When we get back to St Petersburg, you're moving in with Yuuri and me, you're not staying in Yakov's dorms anymore."

"Victor, I haven't lived in the dorms since I got back from Japan," Yuri said. "Yakov and I moved in with Lilia. Go have a custody battle with her if she still wants me around."

"How much have I missed?" Victor half-whispered in complete and utter horror.

"I dunno, eight months?" Yuri said. "Life went on."

Victor looked so wholly heartbroken. "I thought that you." He swallowed. "I thought that you would...that you were skating better. That you had more motivation because I was...because I went to Japan."

"If 'more motivation' meant life fucking fell apart and the only thing I had left to cling to was gold, then yeah, you did a great job." 

"I'm _so sorry,_ " Victor said.

"You successfully brought Katsudon here, and he's a lot less useless than you, so it's not a total loss," Yuri said. "What do you want me to say? No problem, I never cared about you in the first place, you stupid geezer? Actually I take it back, that's entirely accurate. I couldn't have cared less and still don't. Are you done yet?"

"No," Victor said, and buried his head in Yuri's shoulder, but thankfully, _thankfully_ didn't latch on tighter. Yuri's ribs might not have survived it.

"You're so clingly," Yuri said.

"The two people that I love the most in this world both told me in the last 24 hours that they were quitting skating and going away forever."

Yuri froze, then pushed Victor back. "Ex _cuse_ me?"

Victor just looked at him with wide blue eyes that were brimming over with tears and god it was _not fair_ that Victor didn't get all red and splotchy like the rest of the human race when _they_ cried. Fuck that.

"Victor, I was just a dumb junior skater that you hung out with sometimes. Because it's cute when I get angry, like I'm a kitten hissing at everything. And Mila told me you said that, so you don't even get to try to fucking deny it. You were eccentric, and old, and bored, and I'm amusing. Was amusing. Don't...don't make this something it's not."

"I'm..." Victor swallowed. (Later, Yuri would learn just how much Victor saw himself in him at first, and then how much more. He would learn that Victor had just as little family as he did, that amusement was both the prelude and the cover for—for the fact that just as Yuri had never really made friends, neither did Victor, because Living Legends didn't really have friends, not real ones. He'd assumed when he was thirteen and a half and Victor had wanted to show him some childhood favorite movie that would bring the perfect inspiration Yuri was supposedly missing for his free skate that season that it was just Victor being Victor and that Victor did this for everyone. Assumed that when he was fourteen and Victor gave him a key it was because Victor always stayed late at the rink and if someone didn't got and walk Makka the stupid mutt would pee inside. Assumed that—that all the dinners and movie nights and times when Victor would let him stay late and see bits of choreography or play the clip from the latest song he'd commissioned or talk about what went into composing a skating program, that—that at best, Victor was training his replacement. And sure, besides Mila and Georgi, Victor didn't really interact with people at the rink, but he was _nice_ and _charming_ and everyone _loved_ him and it just really didn't occur to Yuri that it _meant_ anything, and that Victor might have been a lot lonelier than he'd ever been letting on.)

Victor didn't say any of that. He said: "I'm sorry." And Yuri felt like he'd messed something up horribly.

"I'm sorry too," he said.

The water from the shower stopped, and there was some shuffling, and then Katsudon came back into the room with a towel around his waist.

"Shower's free?"

"I should...probably shower in my own room," Yuri said. "My clothes are there."

Katsudon and Victor exchanged a look. "We could text Mila and tell her to bring you some clothes," Katsudon said. Which seemed—like _way too much effort_ and then Yuri realized that this wasn't about effort, this was about they thought he was a runaway threat.

Although, if he spent more than half a second thinking about—about the whole situation, about what—what might happen, about how he'd—about how Yakov knew, so everything that he'd built was about to come crashing down probably in a matter of days, maybe hours—

Hell, he'd think he was a runaway threat too.

This was...this was going to be his life, for the next...the next however long it took to sort everything. And he couldn't—it was one thing to be treated as helpless when he _was_ helpless, it was another thing to be coddled all the time because _half_ the time he couldn't keep it together.

"Take a shower," Katsudon said. "And then I have an idea that might make you feel better."

"What?" Yuri said.

"There's the exhibition gala tomorrow," Katsudon said. "We've got just under 24 hours to design that exhibition skate with the crazy lighting."

Skate it out. The strong people were the ones who could be reborn as many times as they needed to. Except Yuri didn't really think Lilia meant for her advice to be taken as an excuse to throw away _Angel of the Fire Festival_ and skate to his own madness.

Yuri grinned. "Call Otabek. He's choosing the music."

Because it—because Katsudon was right. Even if the world was falling down around him, this was just one moment, and it all—and he was going to do what he always did, what he _had_ to do, he was going to skate. If this—if this was going to be his last time on the ice, he could choose what he wanted to embody. He _would_ choose it. He would choose it over, and over, and over again, to jump one more time and trust that his skates would be there to catch him, because that was all he had, that soaring emptiness of flying when he had no clue whether he would land or fall.

He wanted to skate to _that_ , and screw the consequences.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and now, 53k words later, we finally got to the part that I originally wrote back when this was a one-shot and have been waiting desperately to publish this whole time.
> 
> I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


	10. madness

Katsudon tracked down Otabek relatively quickly, which apparently involved making use of a network of skaters and Leo’s Instagram prowess, but either way Otabek was DJing at a club in El Poblenou and according to the live-update texts that Katsudon kept sending him, Katsudon had just walked in and asked nicely and he agreed to come.

They all went down to the beach, and it was a bit cold, and Otabek put his jacket over Yuri's shoulders before Yuri could say anything. There were apparently a number of different songs Otabek had in mind, but the first one he showed Yuri from his phone, _Welcome to the Madness_ , was the one that Yuri wanted to skate to. He and Otabek started to choreograph it, and Katsudon mostly just sat on a rock and watched them and yawned a lot. 

At around 4:00AM Yuri still had a third of the song to nitpick at the choreography for, and he and Otabek were going strong, but Katsudon had nodded off for the fifth time on his rock, and Yuri decided that this was ridiculous. He marched over, Otabek in tow, and shook Katsudon's shoulder.

"Go to sleep in a proper bed."

Katsudon looked at him blearily. "Are you done?"

"No," Yuri said. "I figure at this point we might as well go until dawn, but you _clearly_ need to get some real sleep, so go to bed."

"I could get Victor?" Katsudon said.

"Oh my _god_ , Otabek is 'supervising' me," Yuri said. “Victor’s a nightmare if you interrupt his beauty sleep. It'll only be a couple of hours, he can come find us when he wakes up properly."

Otabek looked between the two of them. "Am I missing something?"

"I recently...got news that my grandfather might have complications with a health condition," Yuri said. "It might be nothing, it might mean...I don't want to think about it. Anyway. I'm very upset, and Victor and Katsudon are a bit worried that I might do something drastic if I'm not under constant supervision, hence Katsudon babysitting me."

That seemed like a good enough public story for now, at least.

"I'm sorry, Otabek, I just don't know you really well and..." Katsudon said.

"Otabek is responsible and shit," Yuri said. "Also, he now knows about the situation. Also, it's not like you're watching me when you're sleeping on a rock, so might as well sleep in a bed."

Otabek nodded and did something with his face like he was trying to look earnest but mostly looked silly, and Katsudon stared at Yuri, or rather the air around Yuri, very hard. Then he sighed. "Alright, if you're sure. Text if you need anything." He yawned and stretched and gave Yuri a hug before ambling back to the hotel, leaving Yuri and Otabek alone on the beach.

"So, choreography?" Yuri said.

"You seem surprisingly okay with his...protectiveness," Otabek said.

"Better than Yakov keeping me under house arrest," Yuri said. "Everyone is really, really worried."

Otabek was still _looking_ at him, though.

"I know I seem alright now," Yuri said. "But it's...it's hard. Dedushka is my only family. And if I think about it too hard I want to run to the airport and buy a ticket right now and just never leave his side. Which I understand intellectually is a bad idea, but I don't trust myself not to do it. So I can't blame other people not trusting me either."

Otabek nodded very seriously.

(Sometimes, Yuri realized, people forgot he was just fifteen.)

They went back to working on the choreography, and it was—it was a lot of fun. If Yuri lasted another season, he definitely wanted to choreograph maybe one of his programs. Seriously, of course. Nothing as mad as _Madness_. But an exhibition skate? It was freeing, to get to do whatever ridiculous shit he wanted, and screw the consequences.

They got it all down about an hour later, and then Otabek played the song on loop on his phone five or six times while Yuri went all the way through it, then they both decided they were satisfied. The sun was nearly rising, too, which meant that early joggers had started coming out, and there was only so much he could get it down not on the ice.

If Yuri were a sentimental or, god forbid, _romantic_ person, he and Otabek would have stayed and watched the sunrise. As it stood, the all-nighter was starting to be felt, so when Otabek grunted "coffee" they both turned their backs on the sunrise and ambled to the nearest open place that would give them coffee. The tiny little cafe they found also served eggs and hash browns, so they got those too. Yuri mumbled something along the lines of "I'll make Victor pay you back" because he hadn't brought his wallet, and Otabek just shrugged.

**Katsudon**

> _are you alright?_

Before Yuri could respond, his phone was ringing, so he picked it up.

"Yes, Katsudon, I'm fine."

"Oh. Victor said you weren't at the beach." Katsudon sounded a mixture of worried and disoriented, like he’d just woken up. Yuri had a sudden flash of anger that Victor had woken Katsudon up first before doing the reasonable thing like texting Yuri in the first place.

"We left, like, twenty minutes ago to get coffee. Sorry we didn't text you, caffeine was the priority."

Yuri held out the phone to Otabek and Otabek, catching on, quickly said, "I'm here and can confirm that."

Katsudon made a sound that was half sigh, half yawn.

"We just had, like, seven coffees between us, so I think we're probably going to stay out?" Yuri wracked his mind for ideas, and, oh, perfect: "I wanted to go shopping for a costume because the stuff that I have won't work. Uh, Otabek is, uh..."

"Perfectly happy to accompany him," Otabek said. "I've been to Barcelona before, so we won't get lost."

"Do you want Victor to—“ Katsudon started to say, but was cut off by Victor in the background going " _Yuuuu_ ri, let the kids have their fun."

Yuri could practically _hear_ Katsudon caving. Tired Katsudon was Yuri's favorite Katsudon. "Alright, but you should come back to the hotel and nap before the exhibition skate, it's dangerous to go on the ice with so little sleep."

"Yeah, so you should go back to sleep too," Yuri said. "Actually, if Victor is up anyways, he should come meet us to drop off my wallet."

"He says—okay, he says text him your location?"

"Got it," Yuri said. "We'll order another coffee, that should hold us."

"We are _not_ ordering another coffee," Otabek whispered at him. Yuri made a _zip it_ sign at him because Katsudon didn't need to know that.

"We'll go shopping, then an afternoon nap," Yuri said. "Get some sleep, Katsudon."

**Old Geezer**

> _[location shared]_
> 
> _thanks!!_

Then Yuri slipped his phone into his pocket. "Okay, we're good.”

Otabek gave him an appraising look.

"Both of them feel bad because they abandoned me for Japan while stuff with my grandfather was...happening," Yuri said. "I think they're trying to make up for it. They'll ease up a bit once they get over the shock of, like, learning how hard things have been? But it's kind of nice to have people care for once."

Otabek nodded.

"I actually do want another cup of coffee," Yuri said.

"As the person officially designated by 'Katsudon' as responsible for your health, that is a definite no," Otabek said.

Yuri sighed and finished off the last sip in his mug. "Not fair."

"You asked for it."

"Okay, fair."

"You going to finish those hash browns?"

Yuri pushed his plate across the table as an answer, and Otabek dug in. It just felt so... _normal_ to be sitting, sharing breakfast, not really having to talk. 

Maybe the last normal he was going to get for a long long while.

There was nothing for him to do with his hands, he kind of wished Otabek would let him get another coffee. "Hey Otabek, what if I got decaf? Because then—“

"Yurio!"

Yuri rolled his eyes but the last hundred "I told you not to call me that"s didn't work, so why waste the effort saying it again. Which apparently Victor took as encouragement because he flopped all over Yuri, leaning his chin down on Yuri's head and draping his arms over Yuri's shoulders like some kind of demented octopus.

Yuri stared at Otabek with pleading eyes. Otabek just looked like he was trying really, _really_ hard not to laugh.

"My wallet, old man," Yuri grit out.

"I didn't want to go through your stuff," Victor said. And wow, it was really weird to have someone resting their chin on Yuri's head and also trying to talk. "I'll cover today, don't worry about it."

"Victor this is _so stupid,_ you're just going to give me your card? And trust me not to spend it on everything?"

"Hmmm." Victor leaned back, thank god. There was only so much physical affection that Yuri could stand. "I've got it! I'll give Otabek my card!"

" _What?!??_ " Yuri and Otabek both screeched at the same time.

" _My_ Yuuri said that Otabek was a very responsible young man," Victor said. "Don't let Yurio spend more than a thousand euros. Unless you two want me to join you on your shopping trip? Yuuri said that you _hated_ shopping with me, Yurio, and I'm _so hurt_ , I can't believe all those times together meant _nothing_ to you—“

"Okay, okay, we'll take your card!" Yuri snapped. "Just shut up and leave already!”

Victor smiled the way he always smiled when he won and wanted everyone else to know it. "Alright, have fun kids!"

"We're not your kids!" Yuri shouted after him, but Victor just skipped out.

"This. This is what I have to deal with," Yuri said.

"A truly momentous burden, you have the patience of a saint," Otabek said. "Specifically, a saint who has just been given a thousand euros."

Yuri rolled his eyes. "Whatever. We have shopping to do."

___________________________________________

There was a Completely Justifiable Reason why the travesty that he decided to call his costume for the exhibition skate was what he decided to call his costume for the exhibition skate. Really. There was.

It all stemmed from the fact that there were two kinds of shopping, as far as Yuri was concerned. There was actual shopping, for actual things that he would actually wear in his actual life. And then there was _Mila_ -shopping, which always happened the day after they won an event and before the exhibition skate, in which they’d go around and buy the cheapest, most ridiculous shit that they could find. When one went Mila-shopping, they didn’t buy something until their partner cracked and actively winced when they came out of the dressing room. Those were the _rules_.

Except Mila was off spending the day with Sara, and it was Yuri and Otabek who were going shopping. And Otabek just… _didn’t crack._

Yuri got a _raised eyebrow_ at the pleather black leggings with sequins sewn into the cuffs that the material itself was ridiculous enough that it was nearly _reflective_ , although they were surprisingly stretchy. In fact, the raised eyebrow may have been about the fact that Yuri tested said leggings by trying to do the splits in them, and for not the leggings themselves, but hey, an aerial splits was a part of the choreography and he couldn’t pick a costume that would rip out on the ice.

Hence the leggings were bought.

Next up was a black tank top with a giant silver glitter ‘X’ on the front and ripped strips of fabric holding it together in the back. _That_ one only got the raised eyebrow because Yuri brought a couple of sizes to the changing room and then a large as a joke, and lo and behold, it was the one that looked loose enough to fall off him that Otabek even at all reacted to.

There was a cheap corner accessory store that Yuri popped into to get sunglasses because not sleeping meant that the sun was hurting his eyes, and that was where he caught sight of the ridiculous golden chain-and-cross that was just _barely_ above the level of being flat-out plastic in terms of how terribly gaudy it looked, and Yuri showed it to Otabek mostly just for laughs except Otabek raised an eyebrow _and_ cracked a smile like he was trying not to laugh, and Yuri didn’t make the rules.

They finished off, of course, with the greatest monstrosity of a jacket to ever grace Yuri’s eyes, at least, amongst normal clothes; if it were something he saw as a skating costume it would fit right in, but—for starters, magenta? and then with an indigo collar, all lined with a mixture of brown and black sequins? Said sequins had patterning down the back, too. Pure madness.

By the time they found the jacket, it was later in the afternoon, and Otabek gave it a full indulgent grin and either way it went with the rest of the stuff so Yuri was planning on getting it. That and some fingerless gloves, also with a line of sequins across the knuckles because at this point why the fuck not, made up his costume.

So _clearly_ , it was all Otabek’s fault.

___________________________________________

 _Welcome to the Madness_ would eventually become one of those things that no one was allowed to talk about, at least not in front of Yuri.

But _god,_ in the moment it was so much fun.

(There were definitely some really, really good parts. Like the aerial splits. And throwing in a spread eagle into a triple axel as both tribute to and baiting of Katsudon. Taking the "flying" part fairly literally as he flew into a camel spin, ending said spin in Half-Biellmann position as a reminder to all the rest of the male figure skaters that he was the only one who could do it. And Katsudon had been right, doing quads with the lights flashing under him like he was climbing on shadows was the most exhilarating thing.

The whole "shedding half his costume and throwing it into the audience" was spur of the moment. As was adding Otabek. But when all was said and done, even if he'd eventually ban anyone from talking about it, he would never regret it, not a single moment.)

___________________________________________

The next thing that Yuri was forced to endure was the banquet. Except apparently Victor and Katsudon had rounded up Mila, Phichit, Chris, and—well, honestly Otabek was probably hanging out with Yuri because they were _friends_ and not because Katsudon had asked pathetically enough, but regardless the six of them all played tag-team in pretty much chasing off anyone who wasn't a part of that circle from trying to interact with Yuri.

(Yuri's favorite part was every time a potential sponsor came around, Victor would wave his hand and say "Take it up with Yakov, remember how bad a head I had for numbers when I was 15?" and a look of horror would flash across the sponsor's face and they would scurry off.

"You still don't have a head for numbers," Yuri told him.

"And you do," Victor said. "But they don't need to do that.")

Eventually, Katsudon dragged them all into a dance-off rematch, which was surprisingly easy to do, all he had to say to Yuri was "You've been training with the most famous ballet instructor in the world for nearly a year now, right, Yurio? Think you can take me?" and to Yuri's "What?" he'd said "I want to beat you and _remember_ ," and, well, then it was _on_.

Yuri was pretty sure the adults didn't think the dance-off was as fun this time because there wasn't any stripping, but Yuri and Katsudon solidly tied, so Yuri would take that as a win. Victor and Katsudon did their tango again, because apparently Victor had caught on to the whole "I want to dance and remember" idea, and it was just as sickeningly sweet as it had been a year ago. Yuri tried not to gag at them and Otabek caught Chris trying to slip Yuri some champagne and stopped him. 

When they were _finally_ done, Victor came back over to Yuri and for some reason Katsudon went over to Phichit and then the two of them started surreptitiously gathering skaters from around the room.

"What's going on?" Yuri asked.

"Usually, there's an afterparty that the gold medalist hosts," Victor said. "It's tradition."

"You mean you decided to do it every year and everyone has gone along because free booze," Yuri said.

"Exactly!" Victor said. "But you're too young for that, so we're having a sleepover instead. My room, I booked the biggest one available because I expected to throw a party!"

Yuri decided not to comment on how downright arrogant booking the room and expecting Katsudon to win had been. Victor was always arrogant. Besides, Katsudon had been a tenth of a point away from winning.

"I have no say in this, do I," Yuri said.

"Of course you have say in this!" Victor said with wide eyes. "We just thought it would be fun!" No one could say no to those eyes. That and the thought of disappointing Katsudon, who was scampering across the room with a bright look in his eyes grabbing Otabek. If Otabek and Katsudon were going to be there, it couldn't be too bad.

Besides, Yuri was the gold medalist, he deserved the full experience, and if the full experience included throwing a party in Victor's room, he'd throw a damn party in Victor's room.

"There isn't some stupid rule like no girls allowed, right?" Yuri said. "Because if Mila doesn't get to come, I won't go." If they were having a sleepover, he wanted her facemasks, goddamnit.

"Mila is coming," Victor said. "She wanted to bring Sara too, and Yuuri is on friendly terms with Sara, so we figured why not. Then Phichit, because Yuuri assures me he throws magnificent sleepovers suitable for the underage, and we wanted photo documentation. Otabek, because he's your new best friend. Chris, because he would kill me if he missed out on the victory party, I promise that he'll behave. That’s—that's the whole list, I think!"

That was an...acceptable group.

"Tell Mila to—"

"Bring her facemasks?" Victor said. "She won't tell me where she gets them, I've gone nearly a _year_ without, I've been _suffering_ , Yura, _suffering_."

That one made Yuri feel a bit smug. Served Victor right for leaving.

"Alright, off to your room to change, it's a pajama party!" Victor said. "And we wouldn't want the guest of honor to be late!"

Usually Yuri would protest at the idea of a group of strangers seeing him in his pajamas, but they would all be in their pajamas too, and he could recognize the fact that Victor and Katsudon weren't going to leave him alone in his room all night no matter what and at least they had the considerateness to disguise it as a slumber party. 

Yuri had leopard print pajama pants and a tiger striped shirt and anyone who'd judge him for it could face his wrath. Certainly not Victor, who had made custom-printed Makkachin pajamas. Or Mila, who insisted on red silk, (or Georgi, who insisted on a black silk robe with nothing underneath, but Georgi wasn't here to laugh at this time.)

Luckily for Victor, he didn't try to tease Yuri, so Yuri let him live. They made an interesting spectacle, Victor in his several-thousand-dollar designer suit and Yuri in his large cat pajamas, heading up to Victor's room. Victor knocked on the door once, then opened it, and even though it was all dark he pushed Yuri inside.

"SURPRISE!"

The lights flicked on, Phichit, Otabek, Chris, and Sara popped out of very half-hearted hiding spots, and confetti rained down on Yuri's head. Meanwhile, a golden 'congratulations' banner was strung up by the window. It was quite underwhelming, and there was now confetti in Yuri's hair.

"...You all know that Victor told me we were having a party," he said.

Phichit shrugged. "Hiding and jumping out is the most fun part of a surprise party! And you wouldn't expect it because you knew there was a party!"

"I mean, I guess," Yuri said. "So what do people do at slumber party?"

And then Katsudon and Mila ambled out of the bathroom, both wearing Mila's facemasks.

"You TRAITORS!" Yuri screeched. "You didn't even _wait_?!"

Victor looked equally affronted. "Mila, you _promised_ —"

"Sara is next because both of you are being children!" Mila scolded. Yuri plopped down on the floor angrily.

"So, slumber party!" Katsudon said. Yuri glared at him because he was a _traitor_ wearing a _facemask_ before Yuri had even gotten to enter the room. Everyone just looked mildly amused, as if they expected Yuri to be this prickly about the entire evening, and Phichit snapped a picture, which resulted in Yuri sticking his tongue out at him, and Phichit snapping another picture.

“What are we even _doing_?” Yuri finally asked, because Mila and Sara were taking forever in the bathroom.

“Share deep embarrassing secrets!" Phichit said. "And then watch crappy movies! Except the first movie has to be somewhat good, then you take a drastic drop in quality because everyone is too tired to care. Just like alcohol."

"I brought alcohol!" Chris said.

"Chriiiiiss," Victor and Katsudon said at the same time.

"Kidding, kidding," Chris said.

"So we sit in a circle and talk about ourselves?" Yuri said.

"It's either that or Truth and Dare, which tends to go terribly wrong, or terribly right if 'everything turning into a depraved sex circle' is your thing,” Phichit said. “But that's a lot more fun when you're surrounded by other people in college and there's not an age range of a dozen years in the room. So Truth or Truth! Yuri! Guest of honor! It's your turn! Is there anyone you _liiiiiike_ here?"

"I like my cat more than I like any of you," Yuri said without hesitation. Then, "Except you, Otabek, you're pretty cool." Otabek didn't have to stay up all night choreographing with him, or all day shopping with him, and hey, never let anyone say that Yuri was ungrateful. Any other day Yuri might have included Katsudon, but see Exhibit A: The Facemask.

"Oh, I love my cat too, let me show you pictures of her!" Chris cooed and then he rushed over to Yuri, pulled out his phone, and selected a photo roll with several hundred pictures of an adorable fluffy white Persian. Chatter picked up behind them, but quite frankly, Yuri didn't care, because _cat_.

In that way the minutes passed fairly quickly, and then Mila was tapping his shoulder because it was his turn for a facemask, and he was yawning by the time he got back to the bedroom. Chris was apparently the last person in the room to need a facemask, having valiantly distracted Yuri for all of the time it took for everyone else to get theirs. Mila had brought nailpolish too, although she insisted it get nowhere near her red silk pajamas, and everyone seemed to unanimously decide that they were too tired to hold hands steady enough.

Phichit declared that the best trilogy of movies for starter-sleepovers was the Men In Black trilogy, because the first movie was one of the greatest movies ever made, the second movie was one of the worst movies ever made, and the third movie everyone was always too asleep to remember. Victor apparently hadn’t watched it yet, and actually jumped up and down in excitement at the idea of it. And then spent the entire time squealing and jumping and grabbing onto Katsudon’s arm every time an alien appeared on screen, which Yuri _knew_ was all a show because horror movies hadn’t bothered Victor ever before and this was hardly a _horror_ movie, but on the other hand, Katsudon looked vaguely amused every time he got to pat Victor’s hand, so Yuri rolled his eyes and refrained from commenting. Also, Chris had his head in Victor’s lap, and it was freaking hilarious to watch him get displaced every single time. Mila and Sara sat next to each other, and Phichit sprawled all over their legs. Yuri sat between Mila and Otabek, and Otabek actually fell asleep on his shoulder, which was adorable. He made Phichit promise to send him the pictures of it.

After the first movie everyone got up to wash their faces, and Otabek said something about an early flight and wanting to sleep in a bed and Phichit said something about giving the second movie a try, it was funny, and besides, he’d brought popcorn, and sure enough he microwaved it as everyone waited their turn for the bathroom and then settled back down in similar formation. Yuri kept yawning at decreasing intervals until ten, maybe fifteen minutes into the movie, he was asleep on Otabek’s shoulder.

___________________________________________

When Yuri had been really young, he'd get nightmares sometimes, and he'd tiptoe across the floor of their cold apartment and climb into Dedushka's bed and cling to a pillow, or, in later years, Potya, as his grandfather watched over him. And he'd wake up the next morning feeling safe and warm with his grandfather like a wall at his back, still curled around whatever he was hugging.

He was hugging a pillow now, and there was the warmth of another body spooning his, and he almost felt like he was safe again, except the sheets were far nicer than the ones way back home in Moscow, back when Moscow was home, and as Yuri's thoughts slowly re-arranged themselves into a semblance of order he became more and more aware that no, he didn't want to wake up.

"Yurio, you have to wake up."

That was Katsudon's voice. He was in Katsudon and Victor's hotel room. There had been the sleepover party. And of course Yuri wouldn’t be sent back to his room even after everyone else left.

Oh _god_ , now he really didn't want to open his eyes, because if he was warm and safe in bed with someone spooning him and Katsudon’s voice coming clearly from in _front_ of him—

The someone made a whining sound and pulled him in closer and _cuddled_ against him and oh, well then, that certainly wasn't Victor because Victor's chest definitely wasn't that... _padded_ , and Yuri's eyes flew open in surprise and he was facing, directly across from the pillow he was clutching, none other than the Thai skater Phichit Chulanont.

He bolted upright and leapt out of bed, which in and of itself was a feat to successfully vault over Phichit without displacing him, and then Mila pawed forward across the vacant spot and snatched the pillow that Yuri had been holding onto, which still had the remnants of his own body heat, and apparently it was an acceptable substitute because she curled around it and drifted back to sleep. Sara re-draped an arm over Mila from her other side, but otherwise seemed entirely undisturbed by the proceedings.

"What the fuuuuuuck," Yuri whispered, because he wasn't an _animal_ , there were sleeping people in the room.

"You fell asleep pretty early last night," Katsudon whispered back. "Everyone but Otabek ended up sleeping over."

"Why the _fuck_ did you have four people in one bed and you and Victor get the other one all to yourselves?" Yuri said.

“Three,” Katsudon said. “Chris is in there still cuddling with Victor. And it kind of just…happened? Mila insisted on sleeping in your bed, and then Sara wanted to be with Mila, and then Phichit took one look at me and Victor and then jumped in next to you to take a selfie, and then just didn't...move?"

That was surprisingly...believable. 

"Victor actually whined about not getting to join the 'fun bed' but I—"

"I don't need to hear how you seduced your fiancé with five of us in the room," Yuri said and Katsudon blushed furiously. "Why the fuck did you wake me up?"

Katsudon seemed to recover quickly from Yuri's jest, (at least, Yuri hoped it was a jest), enough to answer, "Someone keeps texting your phone. I can't...read Cyrillic, and I didn't know whether or not it was important, but I can read times and this one said 10:30 and it's already 9:40 so..."

**Lilia Baranovskaya**

> _I am taking you and the Japanese skater Yuuri Katsuki to breakfast this morning. We have a number of things to discuss. Be in the hotel lobby at 10:30. Dress nicely._

"Lilia's taking us to breakfast," Yuri said. "We're supposed to dress nicely. I want to take a shower in my room where there are my clothes to change into, so if you're going to _escort_ me—"

Katsudon winced, and Yuri grimaced a bit, because the precautions that everyone was taking really weren't their fault, except Victor and Katsudon's precautions had ended up with Yuri waking up to three people sprawled over and around him like a pile of puppies, so he thought he deserved to be a bit salty about it all. 

Mila had been _cuddling_ with him.

To be fair, Mila would cuddle with anything that moved, and plenty of things that wouldn’t, and this wasn’t the first time that a sleepover involving Mila had ended with him waking up to her clinging to him—(sometimes, he wondered why all of Yakov’s skaters were so cuddly, especially the older generation, and then Mila told him how the dorms had really really unreliable heat especially before he came, so it was probably just survival instincts)—still, though, Mila had been _cuddling_ with him and Phichit had pictures of it.

The sleepover sure had been an adequate distraction.

Then it just kind of...hit him fully. Lilia wanted to see him. He was going to have to tell Lilia. One more person who was going to help ensure that his grandfather would know, that his grandfather would—

Katsudon's hand was on his shoulder. "Hey. You're okay. It's going to be okay."

"How do you _do_ that?" Yuri whispered.

"You kind of light up when you're really upset," Katsudon said. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to intrude, but it—I can't help but see it."

Yuri wasn't quite sure how he felt about that, and he didn't really have time to think about it, because Katsudon pulled him into a hug. He relaxed on instinct and—oh, he did feel a bit better.

"Let's get going," Katsudon said. "I'm a bit too scared of Madame Baranovskaya to think about making her wait."

"Fair," Yuri said.

It took him about half an hour to get ready, which meant that they were in the lobby five minutes before the appointed time, and Katsudon kept checking his phone as if that would make the minutes tick faster. Or maybe slower. To be fair, Yuri was nervous too. He didn't know if—if this summons was because Yakov told her? But Yakov said he wouldn't? And Victor—Victor barely knew her? But no one else knew who could have besides Katsudon, and Katsudon definitely hadn’t? The only other explanation for this was that Lilia had _somehow_ discovered that Katsudon had suggested changing his exhibition skate, and was about to chew both of them out for it, and quite frankly, Yuri kind of preferred the idea of Yakov going behind his back of telling her about the demon deal to _that._

They just had the time to sit down when Lilia walked through the front doors. Yuri and Katsudon stood abruptly, and Katsudon looked like he was about to bow on instinct and stopped himself. 

"We're walking," Lilia said, then she turned and let Yuri and Katsudon scurry to catch up as she walked out the doors.

It was brisk outside, and Yuri nearly started shivering, but they were walking fast enough that he warmed up physically, at least. It was weird, feeling shivery when he wasn't quite cold. Like being feverish. Katsudon was silent by his side, but at least he was a steadying presence. 

It took them about five minutes to get to the restaurant, and Lilia was silent the whole way, keeping a faster pace to make up for not talking. Normally walking like this wouldn't bother Yuri—he went on morning runs, for Christ's sake—but the previous two nights of sleep deprivation were adding up. He stopped himself short of grabbing someone's hand, though, because he wasn't sure if he'd ever be able to live that down.

The restaurant was expensive-looking, with large glass windows and glass chandeliers and fresh flowers on all the tables and it looked like it was closed because no one else was in there and the hostess locked the doors behind them, and they were led to a table in the back patio overlooking a private garden where no one could possibly overhear them or take pictures. Which was a bit worrisome in its indicativeness of what Lilia wanted to discuss.

"I'm friends with the owner," Lilia said, as if sensing their discomfort. "I like privacy when making business deals. Food first, though." 

On cue, two waiters appeared; one filling glasses of water and another handing out menus. Katsudon opened his and his eyes grew wider and wider, probably at the prices knowing Lilia's tastes. Yuri just fiddled with the edges. He wasn't really hungry.

"Yuri, if you don't want to decide they have a magnificent egg-white omelette with spinach, sundried tomato, and goat cheese, served with whole wheat toast and fresh fruit. Very light. It won't disturb your stomach."

Yuri nodded. Lilia had never been wrong when ordering for him before.

"Katsuki, the salmon plate is magnificent, it's fresh catch of the day."

"I—" Katsudon started to say.

"I'm covering," Lilia said.

Katsudon swallowed and nodded. "Salmon sounds fine."

Lilia glanced at the waiter, and he nodded, and then she ordered herself a different type of omelette, and then they were left alone on the patio.

The silence loomed.

“Katsuki,” Lilia said.

Both Katsudon and Yuri jumped.

“Yakov has informed me that you are moving to St. Petersburg, effective immediately,” she said.

“Y-yes,” Katsudon said.

“You were trained by Minako Okukawa, were you not?” she said.

“Y-yes,” Katsudon stammered again.

“Your form is stiff,” she said. “It is painfully obvious how out of practice you are, which is a disgrace to both your mentor and your art. I will be taking you on as a student, and I expect you to practice with Yuri as well to keep up. Yuri will tell you what times to come in.”

Making arrangements for training. That was what this whole morning was about. Lilia barely took anyone on, so maybe she didn't want anyone to overhead that she was taking a second student, a skater again no less, in less than a year. Yuri kind of kept forgetting how famous she was, but she—she definitely was. And she liked her privacy. That…actually made a lot of sense.

“Th-thank you?” Katsudon said. Yuri would have to tell him later that he had just received one of the greatest honors imaginable.

“Good. It’s settled,” she said. “I will not be choreographing for you, although that is not a concern until next season. Yuri, I expect we will continue our arrangement next season as well?”

There it was. The perfect opening. Maybe if he got this over with he wouldn't be too nervous to eat. “I’m—I’m not sure that I’ll be skating next season,” he said.

Lilia raised an eyebrow.

“I—“ He swallowed. This was a lot harder than he thought it would be. “I made—I have—“

“A demon deal in place to secure your grandfather’s health?” Lilia said. “Yes. I am painfully aware.”

Katsudon’s mouth fell open; Yuri just froze. 

“I’ve known from the start, much as your Katsuki has known from the moment he saw you, and you him,” Lilia continued. “I take it that your deal has been in place for a rather long time, considering both how stubborn you are and the fact that you haven’t lived with your grandfather for five and a half years. From the strength of it, I would guess a decade. Katsuki recovered from his without ever taking a season off. I have no doubt that you too will be able to make a full comeback within a few months if you put your mind to it.”

“How—“ Yuri stammered. 

“It’s been nearly thirty years since I ended my last deal,” Lilia said. “So there would be no remnants of it that either of you might see on me. But the vision never fades. As to how I knew the deal was about your grandfather, I became especially adept at discerning deals’ purposes due to the particular situation I found myself in, in my younger years. I admit I did not know fully until Rostelecom Cup, and as such decided to treat the situation delicately.”

Lilia had known. From the beginning. Lilia had known and had _still taken him on as her student_ —

“My grandfather…he just collapsed,” Yuri said. “He wasn’t—I didn’t—I didn’t know if he was breathing, I could barely feel a pulse, there was no one else—there was no one to call. So I made a deal. I could have just fixed it, but the demon said that wouldn’t hold for long, that if I wanted—that if I wanted him to be okay, I had to make an open-ended deal. So I did.” He stared at his plate. “I was four.”

“Hmph,” Lilia said. 

Yuri felt his cheeks flush in shame.

“Not you, child,” Lilia said. “Your mother was a reckless idiot for leaving summoning materials within reach of someone so young, and Yakov moreso for not checking when he took you on. As far as I can tell, of all of the adults you have been in contact with, Katsuki is the only one who has acted responsibly whatsoever in this situation.”

“I—“

“Tell me right now you wouldn’t have done something ridiculously stupid and self-sacrificing like run off if someone had tried to pressure you to end the deal,” Lilia said.

Yuri was silent.

“I thought so,” Lilia said. “Katsuki kept you within reach of people who care for you and know how to handle things like this, and in doing so he has saved both your life and your grandfather’s. Your grandfather will be fine. It takes far more energy to animate and sustain a broken body than to just fix whatever is wrong when injuries happen. If your demon is at all worth its salt, he will lose his supernatural safety net for all bodily injury when you end it, but nothing more. We’ll do it in a hospital just in case of complications. We will also put a number of precautions in place. Your grandfather willing, which I suspect he will be after I talk to him, I’m adopting you.”

Yuri was still trying to process the Lilia-approved-of-Katsudon-thank-god part when the word ‘adopting’ sank in.

“You’re _WHAT_?!?!!”

“I am younger than either Yakov or your grandfather, and in perfect health,” Lilia said. “You’ve been living with me for well over half a year, and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. I have no intention of leaving your fate in the hands of all of the other idiots who have tried to take care of you over the years, your grandfather excluded, of course.”

Of course.

He took a deep breath.

Lilia wanted to adopt him.

She wanted—she wanted to choreograph for him, she wanted him to keep skating, it was—it could—it could be the logical thing to do, like she—like she said it, except there was more underneath that. More that Yuri knew quite well. How Lilia had no living family, or at least no family that she had ever contacted or mentioned in all of the months that he had been with her. How much dust would have gathered in the guest room that he had been given, if Lilia hadn’t aggressively cleaned everything in her path, even all the unused corners of that big, empty house. How he hadn’t _thought_ of it as a guest room for months, how it had just been _his_ room in his head. How difficult it was when you were someone that was all sharp edges to find anyone else who wanted to stick around, and _god_ , now that the option stood gaping in front of him, did Yuri want to stick around.

 _Yes,_ Lilia had said about him once, _Yes, it is hard. Sometimes, when the light is right, it almost seems like he has my eyes._

“Okay,” he said. “Thatwouldbecool, I guess.”

Lilia smiled the smile that he knew meant _I am proud of you_ , and he smiled back.

Meanwhile, Katsudon still looked like he was ready to faint. Yuri guessed that for someone who hadn’t had any extended exposure to Lilia prior, that this was probably the scariest brunch he had ever had in his life.

The food came, which interrupted most of the talking, and after that Lilia was happy to fill the silence with chatter about her insider knowledge of next season's lineup for the Bolshoi Ballet and this season's principles. The food was really, really good; Yuri nearly finished his whole plate, which hadn't happened for him in a while. They ordered coffee after, even Katsudon, and Yuri sipped his greedily when it came. The warmth was more comforting than the caffeine, honestly.

Lilia waved them out after they finished their drinks, saying that she was going to stay for another drink and catch up with the owner. By silent agreement, Yuri and Katsudon didn’t speak until they were a few blocks away. Then:

“Madame Baranovskaya is terrifying,” Katsudon gushed.

“Yeah,” Yuri said. “That’s one word for it.”

“How did you…?”

“Live with her all season?” Yuri grinned. “You get a bit used to the terrifying part, and then you realize that she’s not actually being terrifying to you, she’s being terrifying to all of your enemies, and then it’s the coolest thing in the world. Oh, right, when she critiqued your form but agreed to take you on as a student without physically examining you, that’s maybe the biggest compliment I’ve ever seen her give someone that she hadn’t put through intensive training first.”

Yuri could tell _exactly_ what Katsudon was thinking, namely, ‘critiqued’ was a very nice way to put it.

“Really?”

“When she took me on, she checked my teeth for _cavities_ ,” Yuri said. “So really.”

Katsudon laughed.

“She’s actually a pretty nice teacher once you get your form into shape,” Yuri said. “And by then earning her smiles is something that sends you over the moon and then you start to get _actual compliments_ and you realize just how far you’ve come.”

Katsudon looked rather incredulous.

“I’m just glad that she didn’t ask us for breakfast for the other reason I was worried about,” Yuri said.

“The other reason?” Katsudon said.

“That she found out somehow you were the one who suggested me changing my exhibition skate,” Yuri said. “She choreographed the one that I usually do, and—“ Yuri broke off, laughing at Katsudon’s expression. “It’s okay, we can take that secret to the grave.”

The hotel loomed in front of them, and with it, the consequences that Yuri would have to face.

"Things won't happen right away," Katsudon said. "You'll be alright."

"I can grab my suitcase without being babied," Yuri said, although he was certainly still grateful for Katsudon's thoughtfulness, and also, he figured it Katsudon was so good at reading when he was freaking out, that meant he could snap and stuff and Katsudon would know that he wasn’t really upset.

Huh. Maybe that was why Katsudon had been so nice to him in the beginning, he could tell that Yuri wasn’t _trying_ to be mean.

Still, he resolved to at least try to be a little bit less snappy; just because Katsudon knew didn’t mean he had to be rude.

“Okay, let’s go,” he said.

They had a world to face.

___________________________________________

There wasn’t much left to do after that; Yuri was mostly packed, and Yakov had booked their plane tickets ages ago. Victor and Katsudon were going back to Japan because that’s what they’d thought they’d be doing, except now that they were coming back to Russia, it was going to be just to pack. After a lot of yelling between Victor, Katsudon, and Yakov, and a single raised eyebrow from Lilia, it was decided that nothing would be done in terms of telling Yuri's grandfather until the both of them were back, and also that Katsudon would be sent ahead of Victor in about three days while Victor would spend a full week actually packing, and then—then they would be in Russia.

Then it would all change.

Katsudon had promised that Yuri would still have family, though, and Yuri was going to hold him to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I exist on tumblr <http://savrenim.tumblr.com/>


End file.
